


Time Again

by Autumns_Slumber



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Future Fic, M/M, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-20
Updated: 2019-01-23
Packaged: 2019-10-13 05:09:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 42,768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17481803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Autumns_Slumber/pseuds/Autumns_Slumber
Summary: Sometimes we have to travel to the future to discover the past...Jeremiah is a student at Hogwarts, who discovers a riddle that leads him to finding out what *really* happened to the long presumed-dead Savior of the Wizarding World. What he discovers may very well alter history as the world knows it. *This is a Choose-Your-Own story; YOU decide the ending!*





	1. Part I: Saving Him

**Author's Note:**

> This story has multiple endings. In a sense, it is a bit of a choose-your-own-adventure. When you reach the end you will be given a choice, and your choice will impact the very history and future of the Wizarding world.

## Time Again

### Part I: Saving Him

"...took his life shortly thereafter, when he discovered that he was the final Horcrux. Are there any questions?"

Sitting in the back of the classroom, Jeremiah hadn't really been paying attention to his teacher, Professor Binns, drone on about the Revolution. Then again, most of the class wasn't paying attention. It wasn't just because the teacher was a total bore, but also because not a single person in the class hadn't heard the story before. It was a tragic tale, told to children at least a hundred times before they went off to school to learn wizardry. Even the muggle's had a fairytale version of events.

It was the story of the most recognized wizard in all of history, next to Merlin himself. The story of Harry Potter. And Jeremiah, sitting in the back of the classroom, looked up as Professor Binns finished the story. There was always something that he'd wanted to ask, and well, he figured if anyone knew the answer it would probably be Binns, since the ghost had been alive, or rather haunting, at the time that these events took place. So he raised his hand.

"Ah! Very good! What is it, Mister Malfoy?" asked Professor Binns in the most excited voice that the boring ghost could have. This alerted the rest of the students to turn towards Jeremiah and stare at him. Some even nudged their friends awake.

"I was wondering, Professor, since you knew Harry Potter personally--"

"Indeed I did!" the ghosts' chest puffed out proudly; it had always been his greatest honor to be able to pass on the story of his all-time favorite student to everyone who would listen.

"Well I was wondering if you knew what happened to his body," Jeremiah continued. He glanced briefly at some of the other students, most of whom were giving him a perplexed look. "The story just ends at 'he took his life' but I've never heard anything about what happened to the body. Wouldn't there have been some big ceremony, because he was the Savior and all?"

Professor Binns blinked in surprise, because no one had ever asked him this before, not since right after the war. It was the most unpleasant part of the story, and he, as well as all the records of events, had decided not to tell that part of the story. Sure, in some of the rarer, more complete history texts there was the full, unedited version. There were even a few dozen copies of an extremely rare book floating around that told the complete story from several points of view of people who had survived the war and knew Harry Potter personally.

Binns had to seriously consider whether to answer the boy truthfully or not. There were no rules that said he wasn't allowed to tell that part of the story. It was just that even he thought it was too horrible to mention. However, when he met Jeremiah Malfoy's eyes, he saw something there that he hadn't seen in a long time. It was a form of determination that made him feel like not answering the boy truthfully would shame him. So he nodded and cleared his throat to get everyone's attention.

"Mister Malfoy has asked a question that I have not been asked in a very long time. Very smart, Jeremiah, ten points to Slytherin. As for the answer, it is very horrible. You see, after Harry took his life, piercing his heart with his own sword, he was quickly rushed back to the castle here. As you know, the castle was practically rubble at the end of the war, and though we had set up a new infirmary after the original one was destroyed, it was nothing compared to St. Mungo's. However, the mediwitch on duty at the time, Poppy Pomfrey," Binns smiled as he said the name because he could still remember quite well the bonny, smiling and cheerful mediwitch who had so wonderfully cared for the students of Hogwarts for over a hundred years. "Was very skilled and knew very well how Harry's body handled all sorts of potions and spells, as she had tended to him throughout all six years that he was in Hogwarts, and throughout the war. Severus Snape also arrived, and the two quickly began trying to heal Harry."

Most of the students were paying attention avidly now, even though Binns was taking a while to get to the point. Severus Snape was another famous name from the Revolution, and there was no better spy in the history books. Little kids often dreamed of becoming just like him. Being a spy, after all, was still a 'cool' job to toddlers in general.

"However, they quickly realized that there was very little they could do. Harry had done something else when he pierced his heart; he had cast a spell that would make his blood flow freely, in such a way that it could not be stanched or spelled to slow. As they didn't know the spell he had used, they could not heal him. Poppy was in hysterics at not being able to save Harry, and Minerva McGonagall, the temporary Headmistress who took over after Albus Dumbledore was killed, took her away, leaving Severus orders to make the body presentable, so that they could have a ceremony as soon as possible.

"What happened next is quite confusing. You see, when McGonagall returned to check on Severus and Harry, they were both gone. There was quite an uproar, and two days later Severus Snape was found dead in the Forbidden Forest by our gamekeeper at the time, Rubeus Hagrid. It was determined that Severus had been poisoned, and there was suspicion that he had committed suicide, but the records state officially that Severus was murdered by whoever stole Harry's body."

"So where's Harry's body?" asked a Ravenclaw girl from the front row.

Jeremiah recognized her as Melanie Weasley. He remembered that when he was younger, he used to play with her whenever his family visited their cousins, the Weasley's. She'd always had completely unmanageable curly red hair that resembled a bush. As Jeremiah never willingly went to family events anymore, he rarely ever spoke to the girl. She'd always been too analytical for his tastes, anyway.

"Why, it was never found unfortunately. Somebody stole Harry Potter," finished Professor Binns just as the bell rang. Gathering his wits he quickly gave them instructions to write a twenty inch paper about the tactics used during the Final Battle of the Revolution and suggestions on how the situation might have been handled better.

Jeremiah gathered his books and hurried out with everyone else. It was the last class of the day before everyone left for winter break, so the students were eager to get back to their dorms and finish packing for tomorrow. Jeremiah went down to the dungeons with the rest of the Slytherins and helped his friends pack their stuff.

"Are you sure you don't want to come to my house for break?" his friend Cameron Longbottom asked. 

Jeremiah shook his head, "No, I'm all right."

Cameron sighed. "I know you don't really get along with your grandparents, but staying holed up in this castle for Christmas, when none of the rest of us are staying over break is a little extreme, don't you think?"

Jeremiah sighed. It was true that he didn't get along with his grandparents very well, at least not from his mothers' side. They had never approved of her marrying a half-blood. Said it tainted the Black family name to wed a Malfoy. Now that both of his parents were dead, his grandparents were trying their best to teach him how a 'proper' wizard should act. It was old-fashioned thinking and frankly the only family that still thought that way was the Black's. All the other pureblood lines had changed their views after the Revolution.

His father, Jeremiah Lucien Malfoy, had been a half-blood and proud of it. Though way back along the family line it was well known that the Malfoy's had fought on the wrong side of the Revolution, since then the name had been cleared of all injustices and was well-known and respected for great contributions to the wizarding world. Jeremiah senior had taught his son about both the dark side of their family and the light side.

Jeremiah Lucien Malfoy had studied muggles extensively, and lived among them for ten years without contact with the wizarding world. The celebration of his homecoming to the wizarding world had been when he and his mother, Abigail, had first met. So it went without saying that Jeremiah senior taught his son all about muggles as well. Jeremiah junior knew about electricity, technology and the various gizmo's and gadget's that muggles created. He actually thought some of them were quite ingenious.

In fact, he was particularly interested in a form of technology that he'd been studying in secret for five years now, ever since he started his second year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. It all started when he made Seeker for his Quidditch team in second year. The captain, a sixth year student, had liked to hold strategy meetings in the boys' sixth year dorms. During one of those meetings he was sitting on the floor beside one of the beds, not really paying attention as the captain discussed formations with the Chasers.

He was staring at the floor, lost in his own musings, when a puff of something fuzzy drifted across the floor on a draft. He watched the fuzzy out of sheer boredom, and as it disappeared under the bed, it went by one of the feet of the bed, and a dark spot on the finely polished wood drew his attention. He leaned forward slightly to get a better look, and noticed that it was a small mark. Of a lion. The Gryffindor lion.

This was extremely odd, and instincts told him not to draw attention to himself. So, on the pretense of leaning more comfortably against the side of the bed, he shifted closer to the foot. He wanted to know if it was a carving or not, so he casually let his hand brush against the marking. It was smooth, but as he touched it he felt a shock, like static electricity. Then he felt something give way under his butt.

Startled, but more determined than ever not to draw attention to himself, he shifted again, putting his hands under his butt. It was rather cold, with the windows open, so it didn't seem odd that he'd try to warm his hands that way. His left hand, however, didn't find any wood under it, but a shallow hole that hadn't been there before. He twitched his fingers in the hole and felt a piece of parchment. Closing his fingers around it slowly, he held it in his palm, nervous and wondering if anyone would notice. He held it for the entire meeting, convinced that at any moment someone would jump up and shout hey look, he's hiding something under his butt!

However, his worries were for nothing when the meeting was dismissed. Jeremiah pushed away from the bed, but kept his hands behind him as though he were using them for leverage. He felt the hold close as he removed his hand from it, and almost sighed in relief. He stood up and under the pretense of dusting his robes off, slipped the parchment into his pocket. Then he left.

"Yo, Jeremy?"

Jeremiah was drawn out of his thoughts by Cameron, who was looking at him with worry. Smiling, Jeremiah shook his head. "Sorry, lost it there for a moment. Um, what were you saying?"

"Aren't you going to be lonely here in the dungeons by yourself?"

"No, I'll be alright. It's only for a little while, I'll be fine," he tried to assure his friend. He and Cameron went way back to when they were toddlers. When they hit puberty, they'd tried a relationship, but found out that they thought of each other too much like brothers to get into anything romantic. Now they were both fiercely protective of the other.

"Well, if you say so. Send me an owl if you change your mind and I'll arrange for you to be brought to the house," Cameron offered.

"I will."

Laying in bed shortly thereafter, Jeremiah returned his thoughts to the event that had changed everything. That stupid little piece of parchment. He thought of it, tucked safely in a heavily warded velvet box under his bed. The parchment was worn with multiple readings and the many times he had held it, reassuring himself that what he was doing was right.

The parchment had been small, and had only a few words on it. It had taken him a week to find the right moment to finally read it, because he was afraid someone might walk in on him. For some reason, he felt fiercely protective of this parchment. He wanted it as his secret. He finally found a moment of peace during a Hogsmeade weekend when he elected to stay in rather than go with everyone else.

He'd unrolled the little piece of parchment and read the simple, elegant words. It read: _I left you a present. Follow the lion._

Now, he could have thought it was a prank. He could have thought it was a surprise meant for someone else. Maybe a Gryffindor girlfriend of one of the Slytherins. He could have thought it was a long abandoned surprise that had never been found. He could have thought any number of things, but what he did think was that this, whatever it was, was meant for him. No one else. He felt as though the writer had specifically meant it to be found by him.

So he snuck back into the sixth year dorms, blessedly empty, and found the lion again. He looked at it, but it didn't move. He put his hand on it, and still it didn't move. This time not even the hole opened. He asked it to move in five different languages, but nothing happened. He repeated the message on the parchment aloud, but nothing happened. Finally, he glared at the damn lion. It just stayed where it was, reared on its haunches so proudly, forepaws in the air.

And of course, that's when it hit him. The fore paws of the Gryffindor lion were in the air, and the lion faced right, paws pointing in that direction. Jeremiah looked to the right, but it was only another bed. He frowned, then smiled and lay down on the ground, placing his head by the lion, and looked under the bed to his right. There were three beds to the right, and his gaze went under all of them, to the wall on the other side, which was next to the door. He thought that, maybe, he might see a darker mark there.

He eagerly got up and ran to the wall, getting down on hands and knees, crawling between the wall and the first bed to take a closer look. Sure enough, there was a small marking, this time of the Slytherin snake. He had an inkling that he knew what to do, and placed his hand on the marking. It was smooth, and he felt that shock again. Then a square foot of wall just disappeared next to the marking, and Jeremiah stared in surprise.

Inside the hole was a plainly wrapped brown package, with an envelope on top. He'd hesitated, then quickly grabbed the package and envelope. As soon as it was out of the hole, the wall reappeared. He'd cast a quick tempus to be sure that he still had enough time alone and seeing that he did, sat down with his back to the wall, the package in his lap. He'd opened the envelope first, pulling out two pieces of parchment. One was folded neatly and rather thick, the other was only one leaf and thin, with that elegant script on it. It read:

_These will help you find what you need. Go to the Room of Requirement, pace three times until the door appears, and enter with this letter in hand and you'll find what I left you. To find the Room of Requirement, tap the map with your wand and say "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good." When you are done with the map, tap it again and say "mischief managed."_

Jeremiah frowned. There was no signature, and it didn't address anyone in particular, but he would have bet all his galleons that it was intended for him and no one else. He'd untied the package, setting the envelope and its contents aside for the moment. When he pulled away the brown paper he found himself looking at a very odd cloak. It shimmered faintly and when he touched it, the fabric was like none he'd ever felt before. He'd lifted it and it unfolded, and it...disappeared. Along with his hands.

Yelping, he had jumped back and dropped the cloak, and it fell to the floor. He looked at his now visible hands with evident relief. Then he looked at the cloak, and realized what it was: an invisibility cloak.

Now, invisibility cloaks were commonly issued to the highest ranking Auror's ever since the Revolution, but Jeremiah had seen one of those before, and they didn't look anything like this one. This one, in fact, looked rather old. He picked it up and examined it more closely, wondering who it may belong to. A sudden ruckus downstairs alerted him that some of the students had returned, and he quickly snatched up the envelope and cloak and left in a hurry.

Jeremiah sighed and rolled to his side on the bed as he stopped his musings. This wasn't the time to remiss about the past, about how everything started. Right now was the time to set the final plans in motion. Tomorrow morning, after everyone left on winter break, he would use that fated cloak and map, sneak away from the castle, and do what he was destined to do. With a smile on his face, he drifted off to sleep.

********~*~********

The next morning, at promptly ten o'clock, Jeremiah went back to his dorm and smiled at the blessed peacefulness of it all. He figured that it would probably be a few hours before the castle settled down to the lull that accompanied it during holiday's when most of the students and some of the staff were gone. So he pulled the velvet box out from under his bed and quietly unraveled the wards that were placed on it. The box clicked open and he lifted the lid, smiling softly at the items within the silk-lined interior.

One invisibility cloak, check. One Marauders Map, check. Three letters written on now well-worn parchment, check. Jeremiah pulled those items out, placing them on the floor next to him, and then looked at the remaining contents that had been hidden below. One of the items was shrunk to a more manageable size, and he hesitated as he lifted it out of the box. It was a small sword.

"Engorgio," he whispered, and the sword returned to its full size. The hilt was pure silver and weighed as much, with three ruby's encrusted in it. Decorated elaborately with carvings of a griffin, vines, and a unicorn head. The blade, made of high-quality wizards steel which was much more durable than regular steel - something to do with the way it was molded, Jeremiah remembered reading once - it was long and heavy, but perfectly balanced for use.

Jeremiah ran his fingers lightly over the blade, filled with the same wonder that he'd felt the day he found the sword, in the Room of Requirement.

Jeremiah had had to wait two weeks before he'd had a chance to follow the directions of the letter he'd found. When he finally had his opportunity late one night, he pulled the cloak around himself, held tightly to his wand and the map, and quietly left the dungeons. He cast a low lumos under his cloak and checked the map again, making sure that he was following the correct route. There were no teachers prowling about this late at night, so Jeremiah found himself standing before a blank wall on the seventh floor very quickly.

He walked past the section that the map dictated three times, and when he looked again, there was a door. Surprised and curious, he opened the door and walked in...to find a nearly empty room, and in the center of the room was a slab of marble, with a plush red velvet pillow on top that had gold tassels. Laying on top of the pillow was the sword. The sword. Godric Gryffindor's sword. The sword that Harry Potter used to pierce his heart.

Jeremiah smiled when he remembered that moment, when the realization had hit him. The moment when he realized that he was following clues left by Harry Potter. He'd been in awe, amazed that wrapped around him was not just any invisibility cloak but Harry's invisibility cloak. The one he had used many times during the war. It was supposed to have been destroyed, but apparently it hadn't...it had merely been in hiding. Just like the sword, which disappeared with Harry's body, supposedly to return to its hiding place within the Sorting Hat. Maybe no one had been able to pull the sword out because, in fact, it was never there.

He trailed fingers over the letters that spelled Godric Gryffindor, over the many nicks and marks left on the blade from the many battles it had seen, wielded by the great Savior. His fingers twitched and he hesitated at the stains on the end of the blade. The blood that came from Harry Potter's heart. He touched it lightly, adoringly, and whispered, "Soon."

Setting the sword on his crossed legs, he pulled out two more pieces of parchment. Both had been found under the pillow the sword had been resting on in the Room of Requirement. One was small, torn as though the writer had just quickly ripped a small piece of parchment to write on. The script wasn't elegant at all, not like the other letters. This note read, quite simply: _Save me._

He'd been perplexed when he first read it, wandering who needed to be saved, and why. So he'd quickly scanned the other parchment, which was full of the elegant script he'd grown fond of somehow.

_You have his cloak, his map, his sword, his blood. His final request._

_I was unable to fulfill it, though I tried. He trusted me, and I failed, just as I always did. But I have left these presents for you, in the hopes that maybe, over the years, I will have grown smarter, more courageous...so that I can do as he requested. I am not one to beg, but it is all I have left: Please, save him._

_Your ride will find you in the Forbidden Forest. Bring everything of his, some food and water. I've left everything else you need with him. If you were not able to save him, you would not have found this. I believe in you._

Again, there had been no signature, nothing to say who had written it. He'd shook with emotion. Fear, shock, confusion, sorrow...joy. This was Harry Potter. He knew that the only person it could be was Harry Potter. The cloak, the map, the sword...the blood. It all belonged to Harry Potter. As did the note, with the words save me written in that scrawl.

He had hurried back to his dorm and hid everything, shrinking the sword and locking it away. He'd spent months wondering what he should do, whether he should go to the Forbidden Forest or not, whether he should tell someone. Summer came, and he knew he had lost his chance, for that year at least. He spent the first week of summer vacation barely listening to his fathers' lessons on muggles. He was far too busy wondering why he couldn't bring himself to tell his parents, or what he was going to do when he got back to Hogwarts. 

Just how did a boy of 13 years save a man who had been dead for hundreds of years?

And that's when his father gave him the answer. Muggles had been studying 'science' for years. It was rather like a very primitive form of potions, transfigurations, and alchemy. It had always fascinated Jeremiah, because he loved challenges and the way muggles created medications and new technology was so complex compared to waving a wand and chanting incantations. He loved it.

For the last two-hundred years or so, muggles had been specifically studying something called 'cloning' the most. It was a way to take the chemical makings of an individual, and put it in a new individual, creating another person who would look exactly like that person. Would, for all intents and purposes, be that person. Not even magic could manage that, even with the improvements of the polyjuice potion.

Muggles had managed it, though. All that was needed was DNA, which could be in anything from snot to semen. But what worked the best? Blood. Which Jeremiah had. He could have shouted for joy and hugged his father for all eternity for giving him what he needed: a way to bring Harry Potter back to life. To save him.

His joy, though, had been short-lived. The following week, his parents were killed. They were caught in the crossfire of a gang war in the slums of muggle London. By the time they were found in a muggle morgue, waiting for identification, it was too late to save them. The wizards who finally tracked them down brought them to Jeremiah's grandparents, who had a proper ceremony. The next day they said it was his own parent's fault for getting shot. They said that wizards never belonged with muggles and never would, and that this was just proof of it.

After that, Jeremiah wasn't permitted to study muggles, even if he had wanted to. He fell into depression and didn't even think about his plans to bring Harry Potter back to life until the 300th anniversary of the Revolution in his fourth year. Hogwarts held a huge event that brought several other schools to theirs, and everyone celebrated the downfall of Voldemort. It seemed odd to him that everyone would celebrate the death of Voldemort, but hardly anyone took time to honor their Savior's death.

That's what prompted him to begin studying cloning in secrets. The next two and a half years of his life, he studied it. He knew he couldn't possibly gather all the machines that were used in cloning, and he knew that he didn't want to wait seventeen years for a baby clone to grow into the young man that had saved them all.

He'd always been bright in potions, and understood the process of inventing new potions well. He didn't have time to start from scratch, though, so he took the closest thing to a cloning potion that wizards had: polyjuice. He broke it down to its base form, and then mutated it, adding new ingredients and incantations, taking things away from it, then adding more. He worked endlessly on the potion.

In the end, he realized that although he had successfully made a potion that would transfer not just outside looks but personality and memories as well, it was still missing one vital ingredient. In order to clone Harry Potter, he needed a body in which to give Harry. Jeremiah knew that he couldn't kidnap someone his age, and he knew that he couldn't take away a baby either. His plan was flawed.

That is, until Jeremiah decided that no matter what, he had to save Harry. It had been his sole purpose, the only thing keeping him going after his parents' deaths. So now, in his seventh year, he was finally going to follow the directions on that slip of parchment.

Sighing, he put everything except the cloak and directions back into the box, shrinking the sword again so that it would fit. Then he shrank the entire box and slipped it into his pocket. He stood, drawing the cloak about him as he did so, and left the dorm.

It was a quick and quiet trip out of the dungeons, and he slipped out of the castle through the main gates but quickly made his way around the side and towards the back of the castle. He figured it would be less suspicious to leave from the front gates. After all, it was a beautiful, crisp winter day with fresh snow on the ground, casting everything in blinding white. He didn't worry about his footprints, because by the time anyone realized he was missing, he would already be long gone in the Forbidden Forest, and the snow didn't fall in there. There would be nothing to track.

He stopped when he reached the back of the castle and looked across the short distance that separated him from the Forbidden Forest. It was dark and foreboding, but somewhere in there was the body of Harry Potter, and Jeremiah intended to find it.

Two days later they found Severus Snape dead in the Forbidden Forest...

Jeremiah suddenly realized who must have left the clues, the letters in that elegant script. It had to be Severus Snape. As he walked quickly towards the Forbidden Forest, Jeremiah contemplated how stupid he had been. He really should have realized it from the start. Who else could plant those symbols without anyone noticing? Made the holes, hid the possessions? Severus Snape had been the old potions master at the school, as well as the Head of Slytherin House. He would have had ample opportunity to do such a thing.

 _The castle had been half-destroyed_ , Jeremiah thought. _But I bet Severus took great care of his dungeons, since that's where the potions labs are, and all the ingredients...they needed that for the medicines. So the dungeons were probably intact, and Severus was likely the only one with reason to go down there._

_Then again, the dungeons were probably the first place that anyone would have looked for Severus. Which is where the Room of Requirement came in. I bet he went to the dungeons first, for the poison and to hide the items, and then went to the Room of Requirement. That place is so full of magic, there is no way it could be destroyed._

_That made perfect sense. Severus could have hid there, trying to decide what to do with Harry's body. The Room of Requirement wasn't safe enough, because on the off chance that someone was thinking of Harry while pacing in that hall, they might have just found him. But the Forbidden Forest is full of all kinds of nasty creatures. It's forbidden for a reason, after all. Students never go in it, and I bet not even the Ministry has a map of the place. It's probably full of secret places that would be perfect to hide a body_ , thought Jeremiah excitedly.

Then his steps faltered as he realized he was already in the Forbidden Forest, and couldn't see the school behind him. He must have really gotten lost in his thoughts. He realized quite suddenly that he was lost, and to top it off, he really didn't have any clue where to look. The directions merely said that your ride will find you in the Forbidden Forest.

"Great...so where's my ride?" he muttered, looking around. He frowned, puzzled. Perhaps he was supposed to trigger something again, like the carvings and the Room of Requirement? Was there a specific place he was supposed to enter the forest? The letter should have been more specific if that were the case, but instead it was as vague as all the others had been.

He pulled down the hood of the cloak and held out the directions, using a lumos to produce light to read it. He read it again and again, but nothing happened, and there were no further directions. He even read it aloud, backwards, and in Latin. Nothing. Not one single thing.

Sighing, Jeremiah slipped the parchment back into his pocket and began walking again. The forest was rather quiet, but the darkness and tall looming trees made everything seem just too quiet. So quiet, in fact, that when he heard something in the distance, very faint but still there, he froze, startled.

He stayed very still as the sound steadily grew louder. And louder. Jeremiah panicked and held his wand out, spinning in circles to look all around. Louder. A dim light was now visible, getting larger and large, coming towards him. He would have screamed, except the light looked so familiar. It couldn't possibly be...he thought.

Still wary but very curious, he stayed where he was. Yes, that was an engine he heard now, though it sounded a bit off. An older automobile, maybe, from before the muggles started flying them around? Practically an antique, then. Probably worth a fortune though. _Who would be driving an old automobile around the Forbidden Forest?_ he wondered.

The light got closer and brighter until, suddenly, there it was. The car. Beaten up, the windshield smashed and one of the headlights hanging crooked, the fender long gone, but somehow still running. And it stayed where it was several feet in front of Jeremiah, no one getting out. He tried to see past the lights shining on him, but couldn't make out a figure in the drivers seat.

"Hello?" he called out. Maybe this is the person who's going to give me a ride?

Instead of an answer, the person honked the horn. Gripping his wand firmly and straightening his shoulders, Jeremiah bravely walked towards the car. He edged around it and put on a nervous smile as he approached the drivers' side window. He leaned over to peer in..."Hello, are you..." and Jeremiah trailed off, because there was no one there. No one in the drivers seat. At all.

"What the...?" Jeremiah stepped back, shocked, as the car door suddenly flung open and the horn honked again. Choice A, get into the creepy old car that seems to have a brain and let it take you Merlin knows where, or choice B, wander around the forest until something much scarier decides to make you dinner. Jeremiah went with choice A.

With one more glance around, he cautiously got into the car. "Well, I've come this far..." he muttered to himself as the door slammed shut on its own, and suddenly the car was speeding off. He tried to keep track of where they were going, but there were so many twists and turns, and they were going so fast, that he knew it was pointless. Obviously the reason why no map was given was because he wasn't supposed to know where he was going.

"Great, this little scavenger hunt keeps getting better and better," he said to himself. Giving up on keeping track, he leaned back against the seat and sighed. He slipped his hand into his pocket, assuring himself that he still had the box. It was only a few minutes later that the car suddenly stopped, and before Jeremiah could even look around, the door flung open and his seat tilted, effectively throwing him out of the car.

"Ouch! What the hell?" Jeremiah sat up, rubbing his elbow, and watched, confused, as the car spun around and drove away. "Hey, come back here!" he shouted, scurrying to his feet. It was too late though, the car was already out of sight. He cursed again, kicking the dirt in the direction the car went.

"Damn, now what am I supposed to do?" he wondered aloud. He turned in a slow circle, taking in his surroundings. Trees and more trees, just like any other part of the forest. There was no way to tell how far in the forest he was, or in which direction. Huffing, he sat on the ground.

"What am I supposed to do?" he asked himself. "I have a note without a map, a sword, potions that are completely useless right now, an invisibility cloak, a wand and...a wand!" he exclaimed. "Why didn't I think of this before?"

After the war a lot of research went into developing new spells that would have been more useful in defeating Voldemort. One of the spells created was a locating spell. Derived from the 'point me' spell and a bit of a new form of legilimens, the spell would point you in the direction of what you seek. The only drawback, which took ten years to solve, was that people were so confused about what they actually wanted to find that the spell would contradict itself.

Hence where the legilimens came in. If you were skilled at clearing your mind and thinking of only one thing, you could cast the spell successfully. That was why there was a specific group of Aurors that specialized in tracking spells such as this one.

Jeremiah had never tried the spell, but it really was the only thing he could think of. So he stood up, placed his wand flat on his open palm, and took a deep breath, closing his eyes. He contemplated what to think about, and settled on _show me where I'm supposed to go_. He let that thought fill his mind, picturing the words and hearing them in his head. Waited until that was all he was thinking of, and said, "Point me."

He felt the wand spin on his palm, but didn't open his eyes. He concentrated even harder on keeping those words in his mind. He felt like hours had passed when actually it had probably only been minutes when the wand suddenly stopped spinning. Slowly, he opened his eyes and looked down at his palm. It pointed slightly to the left of him, at an angle. He looked up in the direction it pointed, and realized it was pointing right at one of the surrounding trees.

"Well, maybe I'm supposed to go around it? I mean, the spell doesn't take into account surrounding objects," he muttered, but as he walked towards the tree, he noticed the base of it was scratched up, showing the lighter bark underneath. Frowning, he knelt in front of the tree and cast lumos to see better.

That was when he realized the scratches were actually words, carved neatly into the base of the tree. "Severus Snape, found dead 1997. This must have been where they found him," Jeremiah murmured after reading the carving.

With a hunch, Jeremiah ran his hand over the carving, but nothing happened. He examined the base, went around the tree, but there were no more markings and nothing reacted to his touch. Sighing, Jeremiah knelt in front of the carvings again. "Well, what am I supposed to do now? Huh, Severus? You aren't going to leave me any more clues?" he asked aloud.

Without an answer, Jeremiah began to muddle through all the clues he'd received so far. All of them had been rather hazy on details, but none of them had led him astray until now. _What if I haven't been led astray?_ he wondered. _What if I'm just not thinking right? I'm looking for the obvious, when what I should be looking for is something...something not visible without the right angle,_ he thought.

"The lion led to the snake carving when I knelt down and looked under the beds. The letter gave me obvious directions to the Room of Requirement, but I think it was because I was holding the letter that the room knew what to show me. I couldn't have gotten the sword without the letter. The next letter...it had pretty much explained everything, and told me where to go next. That stupid car found me, brought me here...so there has to be something here that I'm missing."

He walked around the tree again, then looked around at the other nearby trees. There was nothing, no more clues, no more hints. As far as Jeremiah could tell, it was a dead end. "All right, think about it differently. Use your brain, Jeremiah," he scolded himself. Pacing in front of the tree, he began thinking aloud again.

"Severus Snape...he tried to save Harry with Pomfrey, but couldn't. Then he stole Harry's body and was missing for two days. Two days where he planted these clues, the map, the cloak, the letter, the sword...then he came here, deep into the Forbidden Forest...for what?

He must have had Harry's body still, because if it were in the castle, the clues would have led me somewhere in there, right? So he came out here, with Harry's body...put him somewhere? Hid him, so no one would find him. And then he poisoned himself, and died, right here."

Jeremiah's head came up, the classical 'ah-ha!' expression adorning his face as he realized what he'd been missing. "He brought Harry's body out here, hid it, and died. He must have hid it somewhere nearby!" he exclaimed. "If it were some secret hole or something, I would have found the carving or whatever, snake or lion or something, but I didn't. So it must be something I can get to without a secret passage. Forest...um, cave? Hole? Hollow tree trunk?"

He'd already checked the nearby trees, none of them were hollow. He glanced around again. He'd seen a hill just a few yards away, behind the tree with the carvings. It was also the direction the wand had pointed in. Cursing himself for being so stupid, Jeremiah started trekking towards the hill.

It turned out to be a good deal further away than he'd thought, and when he reached it he realized that it wasn't just a hill, it was more like a small mountain, with rocks on this side going up at least thirty feet. He could go around it, but for some reason he felt that if he did, he might miss something. So he put his wand back into his pocket and reached for the first rock. Then he began climbing, cautiously finding footholds and handholds. He also kept close eye on all the surrounding rocks, in case any had some weird carving. None of them did.

He was about halfway up when he reached for another rock and...his hand found air. He blinked, looked up, and reached for the rock again…and watched as his hand went right through the rock. "Holy Merlin," he whispered. An illusion. He moved his hand about until he found a ledge to grab onto, then pulled himself up and through the illusionary rocks. He found himself in a rather spacious cave built into the hill. He glanced back out, and there were no rocks behind him, he could see a perfect view of the forest.

Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out his wand, but before he could say lumos several torches which he hadn't even noticed lit up. He blinked in the sudden, flickering light and looked at the cave with more interest now. The walls were smooth dirt, which led him to believe it had been made by magic rather than by hand. Standing, he noticed that the roof was just barely above his head. The torches went along this cave, and he followed them, until he faced another wall.

Jeremiah frowned, and lit his wand to take a closer look at the dirt wall. There, at waist level, was another carving. This time, it was of the lion, but had a snake wrapped around its paws, and the two seemed to be staring at each other. Jeremiah brushed his hand over the carving, and the entire wall shimmered, then disappeared altogether.

Jeremiah gasped. Before him was a brightly-lit room made of white walls that he might have thought were marble, or at least concrete, but when he touched them they still felt like dirt despite all appearances. In the middle of the room was a large stone slab; again white though he suspected it was just a regular rock. And there, lying on top of the plush red pillows on the stone, was a body he had seen depicted in books and photo's many times.

It was Harry Potter.

Jeremiah had been expecting this, he had been hoping for it. That didn't stop him from being shocked. It took him several moments of just gaping at the perfectly preserved, peaceful-looking body that seemed to only be sleeping before he got over that shock enough to stumble into the chamber and over to the slab.

He had to close his eyes, breathe deeply, to get a hold of his emotions. When he finally opened them, it took all of his courage to look down at the body. His eyes locked onto Harry's face without looking at anything else.

Eyes closed softly, face relaxed, it did indeed look as though the boy might only have been sleeping. The black hair was tousled and messy, and Jeremiah had a momentary urge to run his hands through it, try to make it sit flat, which he resisted with much effort. The face was just a little paler than in the photo's he'd seen, which was to be expected since Harry was dead. Still, it was a perfect face, nothing to show that the boy had been dead for centuries.

Jeremiah let his gaze roam to the rest of his body. The clothes showed more wear than the face did. Although they hadn't deteriorated with time, the robes were dirty, the hint of shirt showing beneath just as filthy. Tears in the sleeves showed minor scrapes that were neatly cleaned. The trousers were muddy and had more tears that revealed more scrapes, all of them neatly cleaned.

But what really drew his eye was the large tear in the blue shirt. The robe had been pulled back to reveal the tear, and surrounding it was blood. The shirt looked like it had been bathed in blood. It looked so vivid it could have still been wet. And there, revealed by the tear, was a ragged, newly healed scar. No blood on the scar, it too was perfectly healed.

"This must be...," he whispered, not finishing the sentence aloud. His hand raised of its own accord, and he brushed fingertips lightly over the scar, except his hand came into contact with something else instead. He frowned. It was like an invisible barrier just centimeters off of the body. He tried touching other parts, the arm, face, legs, but couldn't. That barrier blocked him.

That was when he realized why Harry's body looked so perfect. "Stasis spell," he said confidently. It makes sense. He wouldn't be in such perfect condition unless he'd been put under a stasis spell. When I take it off...he lightly shuddered. He'd have a very limited time period to bring Harry back before his body decomposed. With how long it had been the body would decompose fairly quickly. Maybe a few minutes, maybe less.

"So I'll just have to be ready as soon as I take the spell off," he murmured.

He managed to tear his gaze away from the face to look around. He'd been too preoccupied with the body to notice that there was a shelf carved into one wall that held a cauldron, some bottles of potions, and several bottles of ingredients. He wandered over there. Sticking out from under the cauldron was another letter.

He pulled it out and unfolded it, quickly reading.

_Congratulations for making it this far, but we are far from finished yet. You must have some talent for potions to have made it thus far, and so you will pay close attention to my directions. Before you are two potions used for healing. One contains just a few drops of the elixir of life, taken from the Philosopher's Stone before it was destroyed. The other contains a very strong healing potion that focuses on internal damage._

Jeremiah paused in his reading to glance at the bottles, quickly locating the two potions that were correctly labeled. He felt a bit of awe at holding the elixir of life, and quickly placed it back on the shelf. He continued to read.

_You have two options before you now. The easy one would be to use the elixir of life the instant you take the stasis spell off of his body, which was placed upon the instant of death, as the elixir will only work up to the moment of death. The drawback to this is that he will only live a year, during which time you must find another Philosopher's Stone, which perhaps has already been found, whatever year it may be for you._

_The other option is to take the healing potion and the ingredients provided for you and create a stronger potion which will bring him back. I am hoping that, whatever year it is, there will be much stronger potions readily available, and that you will be able to brew one of those correctly._

Jeremiah closed his eyes. While the healing field had certainly expanded and progressed since the Revolution, there was nothing that could bring a person back from death. There was no other Philosopher's Stone either. He opened them and continued to read.

_I have done all I can for him; it is your turn now. You can do this, or you would not be reading this now. Thank you._

That was it, no signature, nothing. Jeremiah held the letter, staring at it blankly for several minutes, before folding it carefully again. He briefly checked the labels on the bottles, though he didn't really care what they were; he wouldn't be using them. He took them off the shelf and placed them on the ground, and did the same to the cauldron and the two potions. He pulled the box from his pocket, took off the shrinking spell, and placed the box on the shelf.

"Sorry Severus, but I have my own plans," he said.

He quickly pulled out everything from the top of the box and set them aside for the moment. In the bottom of the box were several carefully stored potions, a small copper cauldron of obviously expensive make, and a few test tubes with rubber stoppers topping them. He pulled these out and placed them on the shelf, then put the box on the ground and replaced all the other items back into the box except for the shrunken sword, which he held in his palm, staring at it blankly.

He turned away from the shelf, facing Harry's body again. He felt numb. He had waited years for this moment. Everything he had been doing had been building up to this one moment. It felt like his entire life relied on this one moment.

And he was scared.

He was petrified of what he knew he had to do. He wanted to do this more than anything, but he was still scared. He softly whispered the spell, and the sword grew back to its original size. He held it by the hilt and let it fall to his side. He walked over to Harry's body, looked down at it, so perfectly preserved, so serene. It was beautiful.

He felt tears sting his eyes and quickly blinked them away, spinning around so he was no longer looking at Harry. He was facing the exit of the cave instead. Fresh air, he thought. "That's what I need. I just need to sit down and get some fresh air," he whispered.

Numbly walking to the exit of the cave, he sat on the ledge and looked out into the forest, which didn't seem so dark and forbidding from where he sat. He inhaled the fresh, crisp winter air. He played with the sword in his hand, swinging it lightly back and forth. He huffed out a breath.

"I wish there was another way," he thought aloud. "I wish there was a way for me to save him and live to know what kind of person he really is. I wish I could meet him. I just...wish for anything, any other way but this..."

The tears stung his eyes again, and this time he swiped them away with his free hand. Some bird in the distance was singing. The forest had been utterly silent before, and now with the haunting sound drifting to his ears, he felt like laughing. He was scared out of his mind, and now a bird decided to sing?

He chuckled, and the chuckles quickly turned to full-out laughter as the panic set in. He barked out laughter and swiped away tears until he was sobbing instead of laughing. Was it just his imagination, or was the singing getting louder? "S-stupid bird," he said brokenly through the sobs. He gasped and sobbed again, then gasped again, taking deep breaths to try to stop his sobbing.

The singing was definitely getting louder now, it wasn't just his imagination. He managed to stop sobbing, though he sniffled and felt tears running down his cheeks. He raised his head, looking up at the dark canopy. There was a faint blob in the distance, brighter than the rest of the forest. It was growing steadily closer as the sound grew steadily louder.

"Bird...?" he questioned. Yes, most definitely a bird. Flying towards him. It was bright red, or was it orange? As it drew closer he saw it was leaving a path of flames behind it. "Odd..." he had the sense to think.

Then it was right in front of him, landing on the ledge next to him. It was large, with bright feathers of reds and oranges and yellows. Jeremiah was so startled he jumped back, scuttling on all fours until he was several feet away from it.

"Ph-phoenix!" he gasped, eyes wide as he stared at the creature.

The phoenix merely stared calmly back. It had stopped singing when it landed, and now seemed to be content with just staying perched where it was, looking at Jeremiah.

"Merlin," Jeremiah breathed. The phoenix didn't seem to be threatening him, which perplexed Jeremiah to no end. Why would a phoenix approach him unless he'd invaded its territory or something?

Said phoenix decided to move just then, extending brilliant wings and pushing itself into the air to swoop over a startled Jeremiah's head, going straight for the back room.

Jeremiah jumped to his feet, almost hitting his head in the process, and ran after the bird. "Hey, wait! Don't go in there!"

The phoenix didn't pay any attention to Jeremiah though, and when it reached the back room it flew circles over Harry's body before landing, softly, on the edge of the slab.

"Don't touch him!" Jeremiah shouted, running into the room. Then he stopped abruptly, because the bird really wasn't paying any attention at all to him as it stared down at Harry. The way it was looking at the boy...it had such intelligence in that gaze, as though it knew exactly who Harry was, and was equally sad to see Harry in such a state.

Warily, Jeremiah edged closer. The phoenix turned its gaze to him, looking at him patiently. Jeremiah, for some idiotic reason, asked, "Do you know him?"

The phoenix tilted its head in a nod, made a soft sound, an affirmation.

Really, this was just one too many surprises for the day. Jeremiah felt slightly dizzy. He took a step forward, the sword like dead weight in his hand, and his world swam. "Wha...," he managed, his head rolling back as colors swirled. Oh, haven't eaten today, he thought rather numbly and a bit hysterically as he heard the sword clatter on the ground.

The next thing he knew, he was waking up to rather harsh prodding. "Mm...nnngh..."

He winced, and his lids fluttered open slowly. He blinked as a blurry red and orange thing came into focus...and gasped, jumping up and startling the phoenix that had been leaning over him. He scurried backwards as the bird flew up and perched on the slab again.

Jeremiah winced and reached a hand up to the back of his head, carefully prodding a sore spot and finding a small lump. "Great," he muttered darkly. His stomach growled loudly and he sighed. He glanced around, spotting his box, and crawled over to it. Lifting the lid he shuffled things around until he found the shrunken pouch and pulled it out.

Pulling his wand from his pocket where it had safely remained during all the commotion, he took off the shrinking spell and was pleased when the bag grew to easily three times its original size. He opened it up and fished around until he grabbed an apple and pulled it out, biting into it. He finished the apple off quickly and pulled out another one, taking his time with this one.

As he ate the second apple he looked at the phoenix, which stood patiently watching him. "What do you want?" he asked between swallows.

The bird fluttered its wings and sort of hop/glided over to the ledge with all the potions on it. It nudged a bottle with its foot, then looked at him.

Jeremiah recognized the bottle as being the one he had prepared to clone Harry, the modified polyjuice potion. He raised an eyebrow, wondering what the bird was trying to tell him. Swallowing, he asked, "What?"

The phoenix made a rather rude sound and nudged the bottle again, except this time hard enough to cause it to topple off the ledge.

Jeremiah's eyes widened and he dropped his apple as he lunged for the falling bottle. It was too late though, it hit the floor and shattered, potion seeping into the hard dirt floor. "No!" he shouted, horrified. "You just...just...ruined everything!" he screamed at the phoenix.

Jumped up, he lunged for it, but the bird was quicker and flew off the ledge and over to Harry's body. Jeremiah felt tears stinging his eyes and let them flow freely as he spun around, body shaking with anger. "You idiotic bird! You ruined it! That was going to save him!"

The phoenix merely stared, mute and unsympathetic.

"I w-worked so hard on that! I spent years making it! It was perfect! H-how could you...!" Jeremiah sobbed.

The phoenix made a soft sound, then dropped to the ground beside him and curled one of its talons around a potion he had earlier discarded. It flew up to hover in front of him, holding out the talon.

Still crying, Jeremiah held out his hand nonetheless, and let the bird drop the bottle in his hand. It flew back to perch on the slab again, and with watery eyes he read the label. Then he laughed through a sob. "Y-you think I can use this? It's not strong enough!" he shouted, frustrated and angry and feeling like everything had been for nothing.

He scrubbed at his eyes with clenched fists, trying to stop the shaking and crying that seemed to overwhelm him. When he finally focused on looking at the phoenix again, he was shocked by what he saw. The bird was crying. It was leaning over Harry's body and crying.

"What...?" he whispered brokenly, and walked over, tears still streaming silently down his face. He watched as a tear dropped, precisely, onto one of the scrapes on Harry's arm. The tear seemed as though it wouldn't go through the stasis spell for a moment, but then it dropped the rest of the way and landed on the scrape. Then the scrape vanished.

"Oh my...," Jeremiah gasped. He'd read about phoenix's, of course, in Care for Magical Creatures, but he had completely forgotten that their tears could heal almost any wound. He watched in silence as the bird dropped tears over each and every scrape, all of them vanishing. When the last one was healed, the bird turned to Jeremiah almost expectantly.

Jeremiah realized then what the bird wanted. He looked down at the potion in his hand and then at Harry's face. It was worth it to try. It could work. It will work, he tried to tell himself confidently as he pulled the cork out of the bottle. He held out the bottle, and the phoenix leaned over it. One, two, three tears dropped and fizzed in the potion. Four, five, six, seven, eight tears. Nine, ten...the phoenix pulled back.

"That's enough?" he asked. It tilted its head in a nod. Jeremiah nodded back. He sniffled, wiped his own tears away, and tried to pull himself back together. It wouldn't do for his hands to shake or his mind to waver.

He walked over so that he was standing beside Harry's head and reached an arm carefully under the young mans' shoulders. The stasis spell prevented him from actually touching Harry, but that was okay. He glanced at the bird, which was watching silently. "You better hope this works…or I'm going to eat you for supper," he threatened, completely serious. The bird twitched but had no more reaction.

Taking a deep breath, Jeremiah set the open potion bottle next to Harry, then pulled out his wand. He paused, staring down at the sleeping, beautiful face. I want him to live. He took off the stasis spell. Dropping his wand, he snatched up the bottle and without a moment hesitation shoved the opening into Harry's mouth and poured it in. He dropped the bottle and pressed down on Harry's adams apple, forcing a reflexive swallow.

He waited. Nothing happened right away, not even decaying. The time seemed to drag on for hours. Please, please live. Oh Merlin, breathe, please, come on, breathe. Wake up. Live, damnit!

A soft gasp, barely audible. Jeremiah jumped, startled out of his fierce thinking. He watched in stunned silence as another soft sound came, along with the chest rising. It seemed Jeremiah could only hold his breath as Harry took several deep, slow breaths. The lashes fluttered. The lids lifted, slowly.

Piercing green orbs that made Jeremiah gasp and fresh tears to well in his own eyes.

The sound caused those orbs to sharpen, to shift to the right slightly so they were looking directly at Jeremiah. They blinked a few times, and then his lips parted and he said something, but it was too soft for Jeremiah to hear. He leaned closer.

"I hate...potions," Harry rasped out.


	2. Part II: Knowing Him

### 

Part II: Knowing Him

Jeremiah felt such amazing, immediate relief that he felt giddy with it. He giggled, eyes wide, and when Harry blinked slowly and his eyebrows twitched as though in confusion, Jeremiah all-out laughed. He was gasping for breath, tears streaming down his face, nose red, laughing. He was doubled over with it, clutching his stomach with one hand while he desperately swiped tears away from his eyes with the other.

He's alive! He's alive he's alive he's alive! For several minutes that's all he could think of. He scooped the phoenix up, much to its dismay, and spun in a circle with it, "He's alive!" he shouted, hugging the bird. "You marvelous, amazing, incredible bird!" he cried, and let go of it abruptly when the bird bit him.

A flurry of indignant feathers ensued as the bird settled itself beside Harry, who was trying to sit up.

Jeremiah noticed this and immediately stopped laughing, though he was still gasping for breath from all of it and probably grinning like a great big idiot. He rushed over to Harry's side. "Take it easy! You've been dead for so long and--"

"Water?" Harry tried asking, his voice just a mere breath, rattling around in his chest.

Nonetheless, Jeremiah was paying enough attention to understand. "Oh! Yes, of course, sorry!" He backed off and practically tripped over the food bag in his haste to reach it. He grabbed a canteen which had a spell on it to keep two gallons of water in the one tiny container. He rushed back to Harry's side and unscrewed the cap.

Harry tried to sit up, but Jeremiah placed a hand on his shoulder. "No, don't, you're still weak. Let me help," he urged, slipping a hand under the other boy's shoulders and slowly propping him up.

He held the canteen to Harry's lips and watched as he wrapped lips around it and drank greedily, closing his eyes as though it were the greatest pleasure. Jeremiah couldn't help but stare at Harry, watching his every movement, his every expression. When Harry stopped drinking he pulled the canteen away but didn't let go of Harry. "Feel better now?" he asked.

Harry nodded, then turned his head to Jeremiah. "I'm not an invalid, you know."

"Sorry!" Jeremiah said immediately, letting go and stepping back. "I just didn't know…I mean, I wasn't sure how well the tears might have healed you, I mean you were dead and--"

"How long?"

Interrupted, Jeremiah blinked and asked stupidly, "How long what?"

"How long was I dead?" Harry asked as he cautiously, slowly turned so his legs were dangling over the edge of the platform.

"Oh, um, three hundred four years and a few months," Jeremiah answered.

Harry nodded and glanced around the chamber he was in. When he finally saw Fawkes, he grinned. "Fawkes! I always knew you wouldn't leave Albus behind. Were you hiding in the forest all this time?"

The bird crooned softly and bobbed its head in a nod, stepping closer so that Harry could smooth the soft tuft of feathers atop his head. It preened under the attention and fluffed its feathers.

Harry smiled. "Always were proud of your feathers, weren't you?"

"Um, you know this bird? I mean, I know phoenix's live forever but the odds of the exact same bird you knew...," Jeremiah was astounded.

Harry smiled, turning to him. "Well, this bird belonged to Albus Dumbledore. Fawkes was very loyal to him, and to the school…and to me. He saved my life quite often. Swallowed a Killing Curse for me, even."

Jeremiah suddenly felt really bad about yelling at it. "Why don't you seem surprised to be alive…or how long it took?"

"Oh, that. It's a long story, and I'm rather hungry, so if you don't mind could we eat first?" Harry asked.

"Yes! Sorry," Jeremiah fumbled for the bag and handed it to him. "There should be plenty, but I don't know what you like, the history books never talked about your favorite foods or anything."

Harry smirked as he dug around in the bag. He pulled out an orange and began peeling it. "I'm not surprised. History books tend to shy away from the important things, like favorite foods and colors. By the way, I'd like to know the name of the person who brought me back," Harry hinted at as he took a bite of the now peeled orange.

"J-Jeremiah," he fumbled. He couldn't believe how calm and natural Harry seemed. He'd expected confusion, or shock, but this calm, cool person before him was so much better than he ever could have hoped for. He found himself feeling clumsy and awkward around him, and Malfoy's were never clumsy or awkward.

"Just Jeremiah?" Harry smirked.

Jeremiah forced himself to calm down, lest he embarrass himself further. It's no big deal. If he doesn't think it is, then I shouldn't either. "Malfoy. Jeremiah Draconian Malfoy."

Harry's expression softened, and his gaze traveled over the face of Jeremiah, taking in every last detail. "You...look a lot like him."

"Who?" Jeremiah asked in confusion.

"The man I entrusted my soul with," Harry said softly.

Jeremiah's breath caught. "W-who was that?"

"Draco Lucien Malfoy...your ancestor, I would think."

_'Every Malfoy is either a Lucien or a Draconian, son.'_

_'Why?'_

_'Because in our family, you either die with great many good deeds in your past, or a great many bad deeds.'_

_'You're good, right dad?'_

_'No, son, I'm afraid I'm bad. But you, Jeremiah, you are good.'_

The memory came unbidden, a long ago conversation between he and his father when he was only seven or so. To this day, he still didn't believe his father died with bad deeds in his past. His father had done so many incredible, good things before dying. Besides, Draco Lucien Malfoy, the one who had been alive during the time Harry had been, had been a Death Eater, just like all of his family members from that time in the past. There was no way the name Draconian, taken from Draco, could mean 'good.'

Jeremiah shook his head in confusion. "I don't understand."

"No, you wouldn't," Harry said, eating another slice of orange. "I doubt your family is very proud of what Draco did, all things considered."

"Draco Lucien Malfoy was a filthy Death Eater," Jeremiah said vehemently. It had taken his family years upon years to clear its name, and only recently had Malfoy's been recognized as no longer holding the ideals their ancestors did.

Harry blinked, showing the first sign of surprise since he'd been resurrected. "Draco wasn't a Death Eater."

"What? He died with the Dark Mark on his arm!"

"Yes, one that was forcibly given to him. He never did a single deed for Voldemort," Harry said.

Jeremiah's eyes widened. "He...he didn't? But the books…they all…"

"Like I said, history books tend to forget the important things. Like who was really important during the war." Finished his orange, he put the skin back into the bag and fished out an apple, taking a large bite out of it before speaking again. "I guess I should start at the beginning, then."

"That would be nice."

"Draco was assigned to kill Albus during my sixth year. I still hated him back then, and never realized he was struggling with his orders. Until the Death Eaters raided the castle, and Draco found Albus in his office. Severus Snape…you know who that is? Good. Well, Severus was there as well, and he saw that Draco wasn't going to go through with it, and killed Albus himself. I was hiding under my invisibility cloak, paralyzed by Albus' own spell, and could do nothing to save him. I didn't know that Albus had already ordered Severus to kill him, if things came to such a point.

"The two fled, along with all of the Death Eaters that didn't die that night. I was angry. The school was closed to all students, but the Order...Order of the Phoenix, do you know of it? Good. Um, the Order reinforced the wards and sealed off the dungeons and most of the castle, using the rest as our new headquarters. My friends and I, as well as their parents, even Hermione's muggle parents, made the castle our home. We trained, and we hid. The older members, like the Auror's and McGonagall and Ron's older brothers and parents would go to battle when we weren't training.

"The idea was to help me get stronger. It seemed like everyone relied on me, because I was the one feeding them information about where Voldemort would attack next, or who he had taken captive, through my dreams."

"Your scar caused them, didn't it?" Jeremiah asked, remembering the information from the books.

"Yes," Harry nodded. "The scar was my link to Voldemort. He could no more hide his mind from mine than I could his. It was through him that I first began suspecting Severus wasn't actually on his side. Voldemort was beginning to suspect that Severus had betrayed him, because many of the potions the man supplied began failing, or working but not in the way they were intended. Despite all my feelings about Severus, I knew he was an excellent potions master, and that he would never botch a potion, unless he were doing it on purpose.

"I kept the information to myself, just in case I was wrong. I had just turned seventeen when I went to my first real battle. Voldemort had decided it was time to attack Diagon Alley. He was hoping that, with the Alley's defeat, he would not only gain an infinite supply station, but also an easy way to breach the Ministry, since their headquarters were located there. It was risky with so many Aurors, but I knew he had something nasty in store, so the Order decided there wasn't any more time to waste. We would all go into battle.

"It was messy and confusing. I didn't think much of the bodies, because by then I was so full of anger that every dead body just made me want to kill him more, rather than disgust me. It was the screaming that got to me. Cruiciatus was their favorite curse. In previous battles the Death Eaters had been known to leave people under the Cruciatus, and by the time Aurors would arrive on the scene, the people would be so far gone they were better off dead. They would never recover.

"I had found a child, no more than ten, a little boy, screaming and writhing under the curse…," Harry closed his eyes as he remembered that horrifying sight and sound. "I ran over to him, he was near one of the burning shops. I picked him up without a second thought and ran for shelter down a side alley, hoping for enough cover to break the curse and hide the boy safely, but..."

~August 1, 1997 - Diagon Alley~

Harry held the writhing, screaming boy tight to his chest, glancing back and forth as he dashed down the alley. It was narrow and smoke from the area was dense, fogging his vision. He briefly cursed his glasses to hell. He reached the end of the alley, and was relieved to find piles of old storage boxes, obviously put there by the shops to either side. He kicked them around until the center of the pile was cleared and sat down with the boy on his lap. He knew an ordinary finite incantatum wouldn't work, but luckily he also knew that he wasn't ordinary, and had learned how to successfully stop cruciatus months ago.

So he quickly cast the spell, and the screams abruptly gave way to gasping and sobbing, the writhing changing to twitches and muscle spasms. He kept his gaze on the alley as he murmured that it would be okay, as he held the boy and tried to calm him down. Hopefully the boy hadn't been exposed for too long, else he might never recover. But he seemed to be capable of getting air on his own, which was a good sign.

Then, of course, someone began walking down the alley. Just a black figure in the darkness, soft footsteps as though they were trying to sneak up on him. Harry was prepared. He gently laid the boy down on the ground and stood, wand in hand. It could be a friend, so he didn't cast anything. He didn't speak, either, because if it weren't a friend he might be cursed to death before he even got out a proper greeting if he opened his mouth.

Unfortunately, the person was a foe, and didn't share his caution. He was hit with the paralysis spell before he could block it, which was odd since his reflexes had become quite good recently. The figure approached as Harry built up his mental defenses and began attempting to throw the spell off him. His concentration was thrown completely off when he saw none other than Draco Malfoy standing before him, wand raised.

The blonde looked, if at all possible, even more shocked to see Harry than Harry was to see him. Malfoy's eyes widened, then he breathed out such a soft sigh Harry might have thought it seemed relieved...might, if he wasn't so sure the boy hated him just as much as Harry hated him.

"Potter?" breathed Malfoy. "Merlin...Snape! SNAPE!"

Harry's eyes would have widened if he weren't frozen in place. The darkly clad figure came rushing down the alley towards them, stopping beside Malfoy with his wand held out, automatically locking onto Harry.

"What is it, Dra—Potter!" Snape exclaimed. Then the man looked all around, as though to make sure they were alone. "Good Merlin, Draco, could you not have called me with less panic?! If the Dark Lord or any of the other Death Eaters had come to investigate instead of I--"

"I know, I know! But, Merlin, he's here! We finally found him!" Draco whispered excitedly.

"Speak quietly, idiot boy! Do you wish to draw attention to us? We must find a better hiding place, and quickly. I can apparate us to the safe house."

Harry had begun concentrating again, only listening to their conversation with half a mind. He finally succeeded and collapsed at the suddenness of being released from the spell. That collapse cost him, because his wand was accio'd right out of his hand before he could regain his balance. He knelt on the ground glaring up at them.

"Ah, ah, Mister Potter, never raise a wand to your professor," chided Snape, twirling the wand in his hand. "If you are finished with theatrics, we must leave here quickly, lest someone spots us. Will you come willingly, or shall I immobilize you again?"

"I'm not going anywhere with you, traitor!" Harry snarled. He was going over Snape's words from earlier in his mind, replaying them and trying to make sense of them. It seemed almost as if…possibly…his suspicions about Snape's alliances were correct. But with Malfoy included, the equation just didn't make sense. He knew Malfoy was a Death Eater.

"I am indeed a traitor, Mister Potter, but it is not you whom I have betrayed," Snape said softly, coolly.

"No, you were never on my side to begin with. It's Dumbledore you betrayed!" Harry said viciously.

"Neither the Order nor Albus have I ever betrayed, Potter, though most would think otherwise. We do not have time banter. Will you come willingly, or not?" Snape asked again.

Harry's gaze went to Malfoy. "He is a Death Eater," Harry spat. The blonde wasn't even paying attention, but watching the entrance of the alley.

Snape's lips pursed. "Yes, Mister Potter, as much a Death Eater as I am," he said.

What is that, a hint? Is he trying to tell me that he's on my side, and so is Malfoy? Should I trust him? Harry couldn't decide. On the one hand, he had been keeping his questions to himself for too long. Everything about Dumbledores' death had seemed off somehow, and with all those botched potions, Harry simply couldn't shake off the feeling that Snape knew things Harry needed to know. Important things.

He nodded and stood. "Willingly, if you give my wand back," he agreed.

"Only if you do not hex myself or Draco until you hear us out," Snape responded.

Harry hesitated, then nodded. "Fine, but first…I found this boy, he was hit with cruciatus. He's just a child; I want him to come with us."

Snape looked past him to the boy, still twitching on the ground, breathing irregularly. He would prefer to leave the whelp, as it wasn't likely he would survive through the war anyway, but the look in Potters' eyes was one he knew all-too-well. Though his lip curled in disgust, he nodded. "Fine. Draco, grab the boy and apparate. I will take Potter."

Harry watched as Draco quickly, but oddly carefully, scooped up the twitching boy and disappeared with a pop. Snape held out his arms. Harry saw no other option…he stepped into them.

~December 20, Future - Hidden Cave~

"Just like that, you trusted them?" Jeremiah asked, incredulous.

"Hardly," Harry drawled. He'd gone through two apples and was starting on the loaf of bread. "But I strongly suspected there was something going on that I didn't know about, that Voldemort didn't know about. Going with Severus seemed like the only way to find anything out."

"What happened?"

"He apparated us to, surprisingly, the Shrieking Shack. I couldn't believe that he and Draco had been hiding there without anyone in the Order noticing. They were so close to us. I don't suppose there is any rubble left from the Shrieking Shack?" Harry asked, an almost wistful look on his face.

Jeremiah shook his head. "No, when it was burned during the Final Battle, the area was cleared out a few years later. There is a monument though, with a list of everyone who died during the war. Everyone thought it was a fitting place to have a monument, so close to the school and also to where you killed Voldemort."

"You said his name without flinching," Harry smiled brightly.

"Yes, of course...why?"

Harry shook his head. "There were only two people that could say his name without flinching, I was one of them. Albus was the other. It's good to hear his name from another mouth."

"Then I'll say it again. Voldemort, Voldemort, Voldemort," Jeremiah said, smiling.

"Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice," Harry retorted, grinning and laughing.

"What?" Jeremiah frowned in confusion.

Still chuckling, Harry shook his head. "Nothing. An old muggle saying, from a movie...I don't suppose muggles still have movies, do they?"

Jeremiah nodded. "Yes, they do. Though, um, I think they're quite a bit different than your time."

"My time. You make me sound like an old geezer," Harry commented with a smirk.

Jeremiah grinned. "Well, you are."

Harry feigned horror. "I'll have you know I'm still young enough to hex you into oblivion!"

Well, with that said, Jeremiah couldn't argue. Harry had been renowned for his quick wand drawing skills. He could hex him into oblivion before Jeremiah even had a chance to grab his own wand. He shook his head, still smiling. For some reason, he already felt as though he and Harry were old friends. Like they had known each other forever. "So, tell me what happened at the Shrieking Shack."

"When we arrived at the Shrieking Shack, I practically leapt away from Severus..."

~August 1, 1996 - Shrieking Shack ~

"I assure you, Mister Potter, holding you in my arms is far worse for me than it is for you," Snape drawled.

Harry ignored him and looked around. He immediately recognized the room, and turned a shocked gaze to Snape. "The Shrieking Shack is your safe house?!"

Snape smirked, walking over to where Draco stood beside the boy on the bed. He checked the boys vitals as he spoke, "Yes, this is the safest place for myself and Draco to retreat to. Far too close to Hogwarts for the Dark Lord to ever expect to find us, and so close to Hogwarts that none of your Order members would think to look for a couple of Death Eaters."

Well, harry couldn't deny that much. He never would have thought to look in the Shrieking Shack for Snape and Malfoy. He decided it would be best to switch the topic for the moment, until the other two gave him an opening for all of his questions. "How is he?" he asked, knowing Snape would know who he meant.

"He will be fine with rest so long as he does not try any magic for a few days," Snape said, straightening to look at Harry. "Now, Mister Potter, I am sure hundreds of questions are bubbling inside that thick skull of yours right now. Ask."

Harry didn't waste any time. "Whose side are you on? Both of you. The whole truth."

Draco snorted, Snape sat on the edge of the bed. It was Snape who answered. "I have always been on the side of the Order. Draco, however, only recently switched sides."

Harry directed his next question to Malfoy. "Why?"

Draco looked uncomfortable, glancing to Snape for guidance. Harry noted that the man merely nodded with something far too much like comforting encouragement in his eyes. It was creepy.

Draco sighed. "To put it in the plainest, simplest terms, Harry, I am not a killer. That is far too messy and low an act for a Malfoy."

"You're father seems to do a nice job of it," Harry put in scathingly.

Draco's lips curled upward in disgust. "My father has completely lost whatever fragment of Malfoy that was left in him. That monster warped him into some sort of mindless, raging killer. That is not how Malfoy's act."

"How do Malfoy's act, then?"

Draco straightened to look down his nose imperiously at Harry. "Malfoy's are the epitome of dignity. We hold ourselves with great pride, we do not bow down to some creature."

"See, it's exactly that sort of thinking that had Buckbeak annoyed with you," Harry shot out before he even completed the thought in his head. He immediately regretted it. This was not some casual conversation, they were not best mates and he was not being playfully sarcastic!

"Annoyed? You call that annoyed?! Annoyed, Harry, is a roll of the eyes, not attacking someone!" Draco said hotly.

"It was your own stupidity that led to your injury! Not that that is a surprise!"

"Children, are we back in school or are we in the midst of a war?" Snape coolly interrupted.

Both boys looked sullen. Snape continued, "If you do not believe Draco to be sincere, then so be it. Do you believe I am sincere?"

Harry thought about it. He really did. He thought of all the years in Hogwarts, all the snarky comments and extra 'lessons.' He even thought of the many times he knew Snape had saved his arse, whether the intentions had been sincere or not. He thought of the recent dreams and the sense that Voldemort was becoming frustrated with the potions not quite working. He knew that soon, Voldemort would be looking at Snape with suspicion, or even more if he had already suspected something.

Snape needed him as much as he needed the information Snape would have. If he betrays me, I at least know where he's hiding, and who he's working with. Harry nodded. "I don't believe you completely, but you are sincere about something."

"A very smart answer, Potter, if only you could have applied yourself so logically in class."

Harry scowled. "Let's skip the pleasantries. Tell me what you want, why you're doing this. Everything, Snape."

"Do you speak to your fellow Order members like this?" Snape asked almost curiously.

"I don't have to worry about my fellow Order members backstabbing me," Harry retorted.

"I would not be so sure of that," Snape said slowly. "They could always succumb to Imperious."

"It wouldn't be them, it would be whoever is controlling them."

"Ah, but do you know them well enough to notice a change in personality? Small things, like how Molly diligently styles her hair, or the patterns in changes of color for Tonks' hair. How about how Kingsley holds his utensils, or the way any of them draw their wands?"

Harry scowled, opened his mouth, the frowned, brow furrowing in thought. There was a pattern to what colors Tonks chose for her hair? He had never noticed. And Molly Weasley always wore her hair a certain way, but he wasn't sure he could notice a slight change. How the hell should I know how Kingsley holds his fork? he wondered. Snape was right, he might not notice if any of them were under Imperious. "Okay, I get it. I suppose you know all these answers, even though you haven't seen them in months?"

Snape raised a brow imperially. "People do not change over night but you are correct, it has been a while, small things could have changed now that the war has escalated. Provided they haven't changed much, however, yes, I do indeed know all of those things."

That gave Harry pause, and for a moment his thoughts trailed to a question he had often asked himself. "So what is the pattern to Tonks's hair?"

Snape gave the closest thing to a mischievous smirk as the dark man could. "I will tell you when we become...comrades," Snape replied.

"Then I'll never know," Harry stated matter-of-factly. "Now tell me what you want."

"What I want is simple. I want an end to this war, and I want you to be the one to end it."

"Sure, you say that now, but what changed your opinion? The last I heard, you didn't think I was remotely close to being powerful enough to defeat Voldemort."

"You have changed. You have faced war, seen..." Snape made a gesture to the boy on the bed, "the unpleasantness, and you have not wavered. Now, I believe you are ready."

Harry looked at the boy on the bed. _Unpleasantness. He considers a child being hit with Imperious an unpleasant occurrence. I'm not surprised._ He looked back at Snape. "You have something in mind. What?"

"I will train you, and tell you what I know of the Dark Lord's plan. He already knows what he will do, which cities to take, who to kill to gain a strategic advantage," Snape replied calmly.

"And he just told you everything, hm?"

"No, but between my father and Severus, we know the general plan," Draco cut in.

Harry looked at him. "You're father just told you everything, I assume?"

"He's arrogant, and very proud of his position within the Dark Lord's inner circle. He's not stupid, but he likes to slip bits and pieces of information to others, occasionally to me."

"So you spied on him, simple as that?"

"I had Severus as a teacher," Draco retorted shortly.

Well, that settled that, then.

~December 20, Future - Hidden Cave~

"I agreed. Severus had taken Draco as his potions apprentice without my knowledge, so the botched potions could easily be explained. The plan was that Severus would return to Voldemort and tell him Draco had betrayed them and escaped. It would be easy to believe, since Draco hadn't been a very eager follower. It worked, and raised Severus's rank among the Death Eaters for discovering the betrayal, even though he couldn't capture Draco before he escaped. It also successfully put Lucius Malfoy in an unfavorable light. Voldemort wouldn't be so quick to share his plans with his former favorite."

Jeremiah nodded. "That was genius, really."

"Yes, I thought so too. Severus was really very cunning in that regard, very...Slytherin." Harry said the sentence with clear fondness in his voice.

It made Jeremiah wonder what it would take to make Harry care for someone so much. You didn't so easily compliment a Slytherin for being Slytherin with such obvious affection. Even now, Slytherin's tended to have a bad rep. "So he started training you in what?"

"Everything. Occlumency, unforgiveables, potions, charms, stealth, even physical combat. The only thing he didn't train me in was flying." Harry smiled fondly. "The very first compliment I ever earned from him was when I successfully knocked him into a tree from a hundred feet in the air, first try. He said 'acceptable, I suppose' and straightened his clothes."

"Er...that was a compliment?" Jeremiah asked rather incredulously.

Harry grinned. "For Severus, that was the equivalent of saying I was the best flyer he'd ever seen. He liked to watch me fly."

 _I get the feeling Severus wasn't a very sociable person_ , Jeremiah thought. He glanced towards the entrance of the cave. It seemed significantly darker. "I think it's pretty late now…do you want to leave? We could go to the castle." 

Harry shook his head. "Not yet."

"Well...I'll need to get more food soon, and water. When will you want to go back?"

"I wish I could go there right now, but…I'm not ready. I need to have my full strength. Did Rita Skeeter ever have any children?"

The question was so random it threw Jeremiah for a moment. He had to really think about it. Oh, she was the one was renowned for her outrageous articles about the war and, generally, Harry Potter. It took him another minute or so to figure out if the woman had any children, and if any descendants lived today. Finally, he nodded. "I think there's a Slytherin girl, fifth year, who is her great-great-great something-or-other, Selene Schoors."

"Then I'll definitely need to have all of my strength, and I'll need to plan out all of my answers. You will, too. We need to get our stories straight."

Jeremiah nodded, though he couldn't fathom why Rita Skeeter mattered any. "Well, we won't have a story unless you tell me everything that happened."

"Right. Well..." Harry pulled out a pear and began with the explanations again.

~August 27, 1996 - Shrieking Shack~

"Where's Snape?" Harry asked the moment he walked into the bedroom which served as their meeting area. For the past few weeks he had met Snape almost every day for training. It was hard, grueling work, but Harry enjoyed the hand-to-hand combat. Tonks might have tried to teach him martial arts, but the flamboyant maneuvers just didn't seem practical and Harry seemed to be more graceful on a broom than on the ground.

Snape's version of hand-to-hand was simplistic. You didn't need to do a flying spin kick in order to take down your opponent; you could simply grab the wrist just this way, bend the elbow, twist, pull, and push. The popping sound of a shoulder dislocating had freaked him out the first several times he'd tried it, but now he could smoothly accomplish the maneuver, which he found not only advantageous to hold a person immobile but also to make their wand arm useless.

Of course, Malfoy didn't like it, he thought with a smirk, looking at the blonde. Malfoy had become his sparring partner. Snape had said it was because until he could defeat Malfoy, he wouldn't stand a chance against himself. Harry had quickly discovered that defeating Malfoy wasn't easy at all. The boy had a huge tolerance for pain, which surprised him. Shocked him, really, when he'd first heard that pop and had immediately let go sputtering out apologies. He had not seconds later found himself flat on his back with a sneering Malfoy straddling him, his good arm used to pin his throat to the floor.

"What are you smirking at, Potter?" asked Malfoy, no malice in his voice.

Both of them had quickly tired of sneering and glaring at each other. They were in the midst of a war, this was no time for petty squabbles. They had come to the mutual silent agreement that both of them would act normal around the other. Malfoy seemed to have let go of years of anger as though it had never existed. Harry, on the other hand, found it hard to forget, but he tried.

"Nothing," he shook his head. "Just thinking. Where's Snape?"

"Well gee, I don't know Potter, if he's not here, he must be strolling the streets for some fresh air and a nice look at the scenery. Where do you think he is?" Malfoy retorted.

Well, the truce still held, but both of them found it easy to taunt each other without becoming angry. Harry had tried, at first, to keep a strong hold on the animosity between them, but failed. You couldn't be angry over a taunting remark when the person will stand there silently and let you try new physical attacks on them. Which made him think of a question he had been wondering about for some time now. "Why do you do this?"

"What, be sarcastic? I'm sorry, Potter, but my tolerance can only be stretched so far. You'll just have to make do," Malfoy snarked.

"Draco," Harry said. That was all it took to let the boy know he was serious. Harry had also discovered that just like you couldn't be angry with someone who would let you beat them up without complaint, you couldn't continue to refer to them by their last name. So whenever they would spar, Malfoy became Draco. Harry didn't know what it meant to the blonde whenever he said his first name, but he knew that to himself it meant he was being serious. That childhood rivalries were left in the dark.

Draco understood. "Why do I do what, Harry?"

"Why do you do...this...all of this. Let me beat you up--"

"You do not beat me up, Potter. You practice--"

"Draco."

Draco sighed. "What else am I supposed to do? You're no match for Snape yet, not physically, and all I do is sit here all day babysitting the boy. If getting my shoulder dislocated and a few bones broken will help end this war, that's fine by me. No permanent damage done."

Harry's gaze trailed to the boy on the bed. He had woken up long enough to tell them his name, but then he'd slipped into a coma. Harry had panicked, but Snape had calmly explained that the boy was suffering from post traumatic stress disorder. He had slipped into a coma to deal with the things he had seen. Snape had confirmed that the boy was, indeed, an orphan. His mother and father, as well as his younger sister, had all been murdered that day in Diagon Alley, which was now the main area for all attacks. Voldemort had yet to take it over, though it was becoming a losing fight against him.

"Any improvement today?" he asked.

"No, but he hasn't become worse."

It was like a mantra. Draco always told him, at least he hadn't become worse. It gave him hope the boy would wake up unscathed. Harry couldn't remember his mother and father dying before his eyes, but he had seen many other deaths, and knew he would see many more. It wasn't pretty. He knew when the boy woke up, Joshua was his name, he would not be a child. No one could see death and stay a child, at least no one in their right mind.

"Yeah, that's good then."

They slipped into an uncomfortable silence. This wasn't the first time Snape had been late, but usually Snape would arrive before they tired of meaningless things to talk about. Now, though, they stood in the middle of the room, facing each other but looking anywhere except at each other.

Harry tried to find a new topic for discussion. "I saw your father yesterday."

Wrong choice. Harry could have kicked himself at the briefly wounded look on Draco's face. It was gone in an instant, but Harry had begun to look for signs of true emotion, and had started to understand him a little more. Though Draco didn't like his father now, at one point he had greatly admired and wanted to be his father. At one point, probably, his father was worth that admiration.

"Oh, yeah? How is he?" Draco asked, nonchalant.

"He's...fine. He got away before anyone could kill him."

"Good, I want to do that myself."

"Draco..."

Draco looked him square in the eyes. "He's my father, Harry. He may have lost himself, but he's still my father. I should be the one to release him from that monster's hold."

"But..." Harry faltered.

"Malfoy's always take care of their own dirty laundry," Draco said sternly.

Right. Just like Malfoy's never aired their dirty laundry in public, they also cleaned it themselves, too. Maybe, that's just the way it is. Maybe it makes them happy. _Just because I don't understand it_...the thought trailed off. It was one he had thought often when it came to Draco. There were far too many things that he didn't understand about the blonde, but he was learning, and anything he still couldn't understand, he could accept.

"Oh, and here I thought Malfoy's had their house elves do their laundry. You mean you're actually domesticated, Malfoy?" Harry taunted.

Malfoy visibly relaxed and smirked. "Honestly, Potter, do you see a house elf anywhere? I do my own laundry, thank you very much."

Harry raised a brow and looked, pointedly, at the small pile of clothing in the corner of the room. Malfoy didn't have much in regards to personal keepsakes, but he did have enough clothes to last him a week.

"Well I'm not going to wash them every day, Potter. Laundry is done on Saturday's," Malfoy said archly.

Harry opened his mouth to retort, but just then the floo activated and Snape came through the fireplace, immediately locking the floo behind him. "'Morning, sir."

Snape dusted invisible remnants of floo powder off himself and looked at Harry, giving a curt nod. Then he looked at the blonde. "Draco, your father has found a way to raise himself in the ranks once more."

"How?" Malfoy didn't sound surprised.

"He has taken over Diagon Alley," Snape said grimly.

Harry's eyes widened. "But...the Aurors! The Order! How...?"

"I know only that, in the midst of another battle for the Alley, Lucius managed to successfully kill twelve of the Aurors by himself. After that, it was an easy win. The civilians had long since fled, and the Order members accepted defeat and fled as well."

"Who..." Harry couldn't finish. He went over the list of people assigned to Diagon Alley in his mind. He knew half of the Aurors from working with them personally on many missions.

"Berkley, Cummings, Leonard, Pine, Sharpe, McKenzie, Crawford, Mitchell, Grendel, O'Reilly, Pearson, and Longman," Snape answered even though he hadn't finished the question.

Harry nodded. He didn't cry. He had stopped crying a long time ago. Now, death was normal. He saw his comrades die every day. He'd been to so many burials he'd lost count. O'Reilly had been teamed with him often enough that his death hurt more than the others, but there was nothing he could do about it now. He would attend the funeral, if O'Reilly's family allowed him to.

"Can you still train today?" Snape questioned.

Although it was said casually enough, Harry knew that if he said no, that would be it. Snape would lose faith in him, stop respecting him. That is, if the man even respected or had faith in him. Harry wasn't completely sure on those. "Yes, I can," he said.

"Good. Today, you learn the cruciatus."

Harry's eyes widened. "I'm not using that," he protested.

"And what do you suppose you'll use, then?" Snape inquired.

"The Killing Curse."

"How often have you cast it? How many have you killed? How many of your previous schoolmates have you seen on the opposite side of the battle field? Can you kill them?"

The questions were fired in such rapid succession, Harry stuttered trying to answer them all. Finally, he gave up and shook his head, deciding simply to answer the first question. "I've never used the Killing Curse."

"Then how, pray tell, do you intend to use it? You have been on the battlefield dozens of times, yet you have not killed a single enemy. What have you done to them?"

"Disarmed and immobilized them," Harry said defensively.

"Ah, and left them to the others to deal with."

"No I--"

"Yes, Mister Potter, you left them, helpless, to whoever found them first. If it were Aurors, they were taken for interrogation. If it were Order members, they were either killed or taken for interrogation. If it were fellow Death Eaters, they were most assuredly taken and tortured for being so weak, and then depending on their usefulness, killed."

Harry stared at Snape, dumbfounded. He wanted to protest. It was on the tip of his tongue to shout out, childishly, that's not true! but he couldn't. He forced himself to think about it, to process the information, and was horrified to realize that Snape was probably right. Then he had to think of how many people he had disarmed and left helpless in the middle of the battlefield. Dozens, hundreds? He had never counted.

"Ah, I see that never occurred to you. And somehow, I am not surprised," Snape said dryly.

Harry had begun to recognize a dry sort of wit to Snape's mannerisms, but this was the first time Snape had been so blatantly sarcastic. He had the fleeting thought that maybe, under different circumstances, he could have found it amusing.

"What will the cruciatus accomplish?" Harry snapped. "They'll still be left helpless, and tortured!"

"You are absolutely correct, Mister Potter," Snape stated, catching Harry off-guard. "However, to cast the Killing Curse, you need to be ruthless. To kill the Dark Lord, you need to want him dead with every fiber of your being, because nothing less will destroy his will to live. I believe you already want that, and all you lack is the skill.

"To kill the people you knew for years in school is another matter entirely. You need to be numb. Whether you hated them, such as is the case with Draco, or whether you liked them, you will not be able to look at them and kill them without thought. You are far too...emotional," Snape said, a curl to his lips.

"Fine!" Harry exclaimed, giving up. "What am I casting the stupid thing on?" he asked irritably.

Snape nodded and Draco stepped forward. Harry's eyes widened. "Absolutely not!" he exploded.

"Why not?" asked Snape, all-curious.

Harry looked at Snape in astonishment. "Why not?! Bloody hell, he's...he's...!"

"Your childhood rival whom you have said on many occasions you despise and hate. I would think you would be pleased," Snape commented dryly.

"Pleased?! Are you out of your bloody mind? Malfoy, why are you just standing there?! Tell him he's nuts!"

"Harry."

One word, one tone, and immediately Harry's anger faded to a numb disbelief as he turned to see Draco standing a foot or so away, calmly staring at him. Shit, he'll really go through with this, he thought hysterically. "Draco," Harry couldn't say Malfoy with Draco staring at him in such a way, "why?"

Even though he didn't finish the question, Draco knew what he meant. "I've experienced the cruciatus more times even than Severus, and I'm working to learn how to throw it off. You need to learn how to cast it without thought, without emotion, and I need to learn how to throw it off. We'll both gain from this, Harry."

"But...I..." Harry stopped himself from saying, but I don't want to hurt you anymore! It was too terrifying of a thought to examine, let alone speak. Somehow, while forming that wavering alliance with the blonde, he had also come to think of him as…something. Not a friend, not a comrade, but not an acquaintance or enemy either...what else is left?

"Harry, you really don't have a choice. If you don't cast the cruciatus on me, Severus will, so it really doesn't matter. But I want you to learn, Harry, you need to."

The gentle pleading…or the closest thing to a plea that a Malfoy could make, broke him. He would do it, because if Draco could face it unflinchingly, he could do the same. The old rivalry flared up, but as he had begun to notice, it was changed and not as fierce as before. Oh, he wanted to be better than Mal…Draco just as much as he used to, but the nature and tone of the rivalry had changed, and there was nothing hostile left of it.

"...I'll do it," he said morosely.

"With that attitude, you most definitely will not," Snape snapped.

It was time to get to work.

~December 20, Future - Hidden Cave~

"Merlin," Jeremiah breathed, exhaling a breath he hadn't known he'd been holding. "I never knew…I mean, everyone thinks Draco was so horrible!"

Harry smiled wistfully, "I thought so too, until I got to know him. In reality he was…he was wonderful."

Jeremiah flushed, because from the expression on Harry's face and the way it had been said, he could figure out that Harry didn't just mean Draco's personality. He quickly discarded any thoughts that led to before he went down a path he wasn't ready for yet. "So you cast the curse?"

Harry blinked as though drawing out of his inner musings and looked at Jeremiah. He nodded. "Yes. But, it didn't work, not at first. In fact, I couldn't so much as make Draco wince at first. I just didn't want to hurt him. I couldn't get past the calm, accepting expression on his face. I couldn't look past the fact that, standing before me, was someone who would willingly subject themselves to the cruciatus for me.

"I knew others had done so, at some point, when they were tortured by Voldemort for information about me, but this was different. He was standing right in front of me and I was watching him subject himself. In all my nightmares, all those images I saw through Voldemort’s eyes, I never saw anyone stand so calmly when they knew they would soon be tortured. Draco didn't just accept it, he did what I would have expected from him under any other circumstance, he flung himself head-first into it with no regrets and no second-guesses," Harry explained.

"So...how did you get it to work?" Jeremiah knew that Harry had used the cruciatus several times during the war, so at some point Harry had to have gotten it right.

"It was a long battle to get it right. Draco began getting annoyed with my lack of progress, until finally he snapped. He had Severus cast it on him because I wasn't getting any better. Severus didn't even question it, he just waved his wand and cast the spell, as though he were summoning a glass of water instead of sentencing someone to torture.

"When Draco dropped to the floor that first time, writhing and screaming at my feet, I felt sick. I had seen so many others suffer the effects of the curse, but to be so close, and to know that it was done in affection instead of anger, it was somehow more cruel to watch. I didn't even think, just dropped to my knees beside Draco, but Severus grabbed me about the waist, pulled me against him, and held me, forcing me to watch. He didn't say anything, and neither did I.

"We just listened to Draco screaming, writhing, god it was awful," Harry said in disgust. "After five minutes, Severus stopped it. He gave Draco some potions, put him to sleep, and told me, calm as you please, that until I could cast the cruciatus, he would add another five minutes to the curse every day. Draco would have to suffer, every day, because I couldn't torture him."

"That's horrible!" Jeremiah exclaimed.

Harry nodded in agreement, pulling out a few slices of cheese from the food bag. He took another sip of water before continuing. "Yeah, it was. Every day I had to watch Draco struggle. Every day he would insist that it was helping, and that he was getting closer to being able to throw it off, but I couldn't see it. All I could see was the shaking of his muscles that never quite went away, the even paler pallor of his face, the dark circles under his eyes.

"He was like an entirely different person. This wasn't a Draco I knew. The Draco I knew would have given up and yelled and screamed in pain, but somehow he steadily began to scream less and less. I never even noticed it, until finally I broke. One day, after a particularly nasty argument with my friends Hermione and Ron…they didn't like that I wouldn't tell them where I was going every day. Anyway, I wasn't in the best of moods, and I was even angrier that I had to keep everything a secret from my two best mates.

"So I practically stormed into the room. Severus wasn't there yet. Draco didn't even have time to greet me before I cast the curse on him. He dropped to the floor, spasming and writhing and screaming, and all I could think of was that he was doing this on purpose. That he wanted to be put under the curse, and…it was demented, but I thought it was the most amazing thing. I just watched him, stood over his writhing form, and just watched, without being held, without being forced."

Jeremiah was transfixed. He tried to picture it in his mind. He remembered the summers spent with his father in the country house. Every spring birds would build nests in the trees, and his father would take him out to watch them. Jeremiah had always found it fascinating to see them build such sturdy, perfect nests made of flimsy little twigs and assorted things they found.

Then of course the eggs would hatch and for a few weeks there would be happy, cheerful chirping from little birds. Until it was time for them to leave the nest. His father somehow always knew when the little birds would leave, and took him to watch. The chicks would move to the edge of the nest and, as though they weren't even thinking, they would jump, fully expecting to fly.

However, many of the little birds wouldn't fly. They would drop to the ground, often killed from the fall. The first time he had seen that happen he had begged his father to make them fly, but his father had told him that this wasn't something magic could fix. All we could do was watch and hope for the best, because if they accomplished it themselves, it would be all the greater.

And of course it was. Watching the successful birds fly away, wavering at first but growing stronger, was amazing. He felt somehow proud, and he wasn't even the parent, hadn't even raised the bird. Yet, watching the bird grow, he felt much like it was his bird. Then there were the birds that couldn't leave the nest on their own. The mother bird would push the little bird out, and it would either fly or die. Sink or swim, isn't that the expression? he thought. He could imagine how Harry would have felt, watching Draco.

"I didn't know how long I had stood over him, though later Severus said it must have been about ten minutes, before Draco did it. He threw the curse off. I didn't even notice right away that the screaming and writhing had stopped. He lay there panting, twitching in the aftermath, sweat beading on his upper lip, his forehead, hair in a disarray, and I didn't even notice until he smiled up at me.

"He smiled and said 'you did it, Harry.' Severus arrived then, and quickly administered the potions, and put Draco to sleep before I could talk to him. I was so confused…I couldn't believe what I had done, and even more, what Draco had done. I never thought he would be able to throw the cruciatus off...but he did it."

"Merlin, none of this is in the history books. Why didn't anyone know about this?" Jeremiah asked. "How could anyone have misjudged Draco so much? So many years where everyone thought our family was still loyal to Voldemort, even after his death! It took decades to clear our name enough just to be admitted back into regular society!" Jeremiah exclaimed.

Harry sighed. "I never told anyone about the lessons, ever. Do you understand now? It was the biggest secret of the war. In the end, I don't even think Voldemort figured it out. I had hoped to protect Draco by not letting anyone know he was involved. The plan was that, years after I defeated Voldemort, Draco would mysteriously reappear, and his name would be cleared. But…that obviously didn't happen. I'm sorry your family suffered for it, Jeremiah," Harry said earnestly.

Jeremiah shook his head enthusiastically. "No, it's fine! It wasn't your fault, and it wasn't Draco's, I just can't believe how stupid everyone was. Well, maybe I can, since it was during a war and everything. I suppose not everything could survive."

The words came out before he thought, and he didn't even realize what he had said until Harry said, softly, "No, not everything."

"Oh, gods, I'm sorry! I didn't--"

"No, it's okay. It was a long time ago. Even if anyone I knew had survived, they would be dead by now," Harry said.

He's really all alone in this time, Jeremiah thought. Then he smiled. "Maybe more of your friends survived than you think. I recognize some of the names you've been talking about. I have classmates that go by their names. If you tell me everyone you knew, I can tell you if they survived and had kids, if any of their descendants are alive today."

Harry visibly brightened at the thought, but he didn't answer right away. He seemed to be going over the options, trying to decide whom to ask about. Finally, he said, "Hermione and Ron. Did they survive? Hermione had just found out she was pregnant when the Final Battle arrived and...I saw her fall, but I never found out if she was dead.

Jeremiah smiled. This he knew. "Hermione Granger-Weasley. She survived, and so did her child, a little girl she named Harriet. She became the Headmistress of Hogwarts and held that position for one-hundred fifty-two years. In fact, there is a Ravenclaw girl in my grade who is a Weasley, and I think she's directly descended from Hermione and Ron's branch of the family."

"And...Ron? Did he survive?" Harry asked tentatively.

Jeremiah nodded. "Yes, he survived. But…" he thought back, then sighed. "I don't think he lived very long afterwards, though. Complications from a curse gone wrong. Something about his wand backfiring on him, I think."

Surprisingly, Harry smiled. "I told him he needed a new wand," he said ruefully.

If Harry could smile about his friend dying in such a way, then so could Jeremiah. "So, who else do you want to know about?"

"Um…later. Right now, I want to finish telling my story, and then I want to get up and stretch my legs a bit. Laying in one position for centuries isn't good for the muscles."

Jeremiah glanced at those muscles. He had felt them when he had been checking the wounds. He knew that they had been preserved through the stasis spell. Harry was very well-defined with sinewy muscle. When he looked up again, Harry was staring at him, a brow raised. Jeremiah flushed. "Right, um, stretching...I mean, uh..."

"So Severus left after he put Draco to sleep," Harry smoothly cut in.

Jeremiah nodded, sighing in relief. I'm in a cave, and I just dug myself into a hole. That's me, nature boy, he thought sardonically.

"But I stayed. I wanted to wait for Draco to wake up, I wanted to apologize. I may not have liked him, but I had grown to respect him, and no matter what Draco had said, it was wrong for me to attack him like that."

~August 27, 1996 - Shrieking Shack~

Harry paced, sat, got up and paced some more. Occasionally, he would go to Joshua's side and check that the boy was still doing all right. He refused to go to Draco's side, because he was not worried. He just wanted to apologize.

There was a slight sound of clothing shifting, and Harry spun about. Draco's eyelids fluttered. Harry stopped himself from running to Draco's side; instead, he walked. Peering down over the blonde, Harry waited with more anticipation than he would have liked. The lids fluttered open, and those piercing eyes locked onto his.

Harry let out the breath he hadn't known he had been holding in a sudden whoosh, right in Draco's face. The blonde swallowed visibly, parted his lips, and a pink tongue darted out to wet them quickly. Somehow, Harry found his own lips hovering just above Draco's. They were almost touching, their lips. Almost, getting closer...

"Harry," Draco said, breathy, and it wasn't a protest.

Harry flung himself backwards. "I-I'm glad you're awake! I'm sorry! See you tomorrow!" he practically shouted as he ran out of the room.

~December 20, Future - Hidden Cave~

"What?!" Jeremiah exclaimed, forgetting himself and his embarrassment about being told something so intimate. "Why didn't you kiss him? Why did you run away?"

Harry grinned, amused. "Well, hell, for one thing, I was straight. For another thing, I still didn't like him. And, for a third, I was scared shitless."

Jeremiah's brain didn't get the was part of that explanation and he flushed in embarrassment. _Oh, merlin, now he's going to think that I...well, I mean...oh, shit!_ "O-Of course! Sorry!"

Harry was still grinning. "Oh, don't worry, we did get back to that kiss."


	3. Part III: Loving Him

This is a choose-your-own ending. The choice you make at the end of this chapter affects how the story ends.

### 

Part Three: Loving Him

~August 30, 1996 - Shrieking Shack~

Harry was nervous. For the past three days, Snape had been closely watching Draco and him during practice. Draco was steadily learning to throw the curse. The boy had been downing more calming draughts than Harry thought was safe, but if Snape said that it was all right, then Harry had to believe it. The worst part, in Harry's mind at least, was that he was getting better at casting the curse. With each day, each curse, it was easier and easier for him to separate himself from the person he was casting it on. It was as though he were casting it on an object, not a person. 

_I'm going numb, just like Snape said_ , he thought dismally. It scared him. Draco hadn't said anything about that day three days ago, and Snape hadn't commented on it either. Harry could guess that the two of them knew he didn't want to talk about it. That's a lie, though. I want to talk about it. I want to know why Draco seemed…Harry stopped that train of thought abruptly. He didn't want to know. If he knew, he'd be forced to think about it, and he didn't want to think about it. 

When Harry entered the room in the Shrieking Shack, Draco was napping by the hearth. He had pulled the sofa from the back of the room closer to the fire. Harry went over to the other boy, who was still in a coma on the bed. He checked for a pulse, because it had become his habit of late, and was pleased when he found it strong and steady as always. 

Then Harry sat in front of the hearth and leaned back against the front of the sofa, patiently waiting for Snape to arrive or Draco to wake up. He didn't want to wake Draco, because Snape had said that with all the strain that Draco had been putting on his body lately, he needed as much sleep as he could get. Harry stared at the fire and thought about how far he had come, how much his opinions of his old professor and school rival had changed. 

_So far, Snape hasn't betrayed me. Voldemort seems pleased that the potions being brewed are working effectively now, and I know I should be angry with Snape for killing so many people when he should be sabotaging the potions, but somehow I'm not. Snape gives me information, and I feed it to the Order, and we've saved more lives in the past month than we have in the past six months put together._

_And Draco…I just don't know what to think about him. He can throw off the cruiciatus…pretty soon he'll be able to do it without much difficulty…and he seems happy every time I'm able to cast it without flinching, without wincing. Even Snape seems to be in a better mood. Why are they so pleased that I'm becoming…Harry stopped. He was about to think, evil, and just couldn't bring himself to do it. He couldn't think of himself as evil. He wasn't like Voldemort. Voldemort was evil. He was…something else. He was doing what he had to to put an end to this war. To kill Voldemort._

"Potter?" 

Harry glanced back at Draco. The blonde had dark circles under his eyes, but he was alert, like he always was when he first woke up. "'Morning," Harry said. 

Draco glanced at the clock on the mantle above the fireplace. "Evening, you mean." 

Harry shrugged. "Snape isn't here yet. Are you hungry? I could make some eggs or something," Harry offered. Snape had begun stocking food in the Shack, and though it was too dangerous to cook downstairs in the kitchen where someone would be more likely to look through the windows, they had a few pots and pans to cook in the fireplace. 

"Snape isn't coming today. He dropped by this morning and told me he would be busy all day. He left some potions and said we should try the cruciatus a few more times," Draco informed him, then sat up on the sofa. He stretched his limbs and yawned. "Eggs sound good though." 

Harry nodded and tried not to think about the fact that they were alone again. He gathered the ingredients and set the pan on the grate they had placed in the fire, then cracked a few eggs over it. Harry had learned that Draco never cooked. He doubted the boy even knew how to cook. Snape, apparently, usually did it for him. 

They remained in comfortable silence while the eggs cooked, and when they were done Harry slid them onto a plate and handed them to Draco, then cast a spell to clean the pan and set that aside with the other cooking utensils. When Draco was done eating, Harry did the same to his plate. 

Draco stood and stretched again, then padded over to the usual spot he stood when they practiced cruciatus. "Okay, I'm ready." 

Harry nodded and stood as well, walking over to his own spot. "Crucio!" he shouted. 

Draco dropped. 

~December 20, Future - Hidden Cave~

"He threw it in ten seconds flat. It was the fastest time yet," Harry said with a fond smile. "He was grinning and panting on the floor, looking up at me with that happy, giddy gaze of his, and it melted me. I may not have understood why he subjected himself to the torture, but there was no doubt in my mind that he was proud of his accomplishment, and I was proud as well. 

"I helped him up and impulsively hugged him, and we were both laughing," Harry continued, his gaze going cloudy as he remembered it. "He kissed my cheek and cried out that he had done it, finally, thrown the curse in ten seconds! He was so happy and it was infectious. Before I knew it, he was telling me he was proud of me as well, and it didn't quite register in my mind so I just kept smiling, happily oblivious. 

"When he pulled back from the hug, our gazes locked, and both of our happy expressions faded as things suddenly got serious. We were still loosely holding each other, and his gaze dropped slightly, and I licked my lips nervously, and his eyes did this cloudy thing," Harry continued softly, not aware that his own eyes were doing that cloudy thing. 

Jeremiah waited with baited breath. This is it, the kiss… 

~August 30, 1996 - Shrieking Shack~

"Harry," Draco said softly, just a murmur. One full of anticipation. 

"Draco," Harry struggled to get out, his voice just as low. One of fear and nervousness. 

Draco leaned forward, and their lips touched. It was soft, that kiss. Soft and hesitant, just the barest meeting of lips. As though they were exploring, trying to decide whether this was good or bad. Whether they should continue or not. The kiss grew, but it didn't become passionate. This was a trial kiss. They parted lips and hesitantly stroked their tongues against each other, against their lips. 

Their gazes never left each other, and Harry thought, this isn't so bad, before he pulled away. He licked his lips and looked anywhere but at Draco, his breathing slightly off. He fidgeted. He was straight. He knew he was straight. He had never, ever been aroused by a bloke. He'd never found a bloke attractive. Just because he enjoyed this kiss didn't mean he was queer. It didn't mean he liked blokes. No, this wasn't queer, it was just…something else. It was because he and Draco were so close. Because they had a connection that no one, save for Snape, had. Because they were more than just comrades…they were…something else. 

"That wasn't so bad," Draco murmured quietly, almost as though he was pleasantly surprised. 

Harry laughed nervously. "Yeah, for a bloke you kiss pretty well, Malfoy," he said, still not looking at the blonde. 

Draco stepped in front of Harry, forcing Harry to look at him. Draco was frowning. "Harry," he said with emphasis. 

_Oh_ , Harry thought, his lips parting to form the word. _I can't hide from him. I can't hide behind the Malfoy name_ , he thought with a touch of panic. "This…I just…" Harry sighed in frustration and looked away again. "Don't ask it of me, Draco. I just…I don't know," he finished softly and looked back at Draco. 

Draco studied his gaze for a moment, then nodded. "I don't know, either," he admitted. 

~December 20, Future - Hidden Cave~

"What? That's it?!" Jeremiah exploded when Harry didn't go on. He couldn't believe it just ended like that. There had to be more! 

Harry smiled ruefully. "We were both scared out of our minds. We didn't know what that kiss meant, how it would change our tentative truce. We needed time to think about it, by ourselves. So we didn't talk about it for an entire week. We continued lessons with Snape, chatted about the battle strategies. I think it bothered me more than it bothered Draco, kissing a bloke. I had dated Cho, and kissed a few girls before, but this was so much different. 

"It took our lives to be flipped over in order for me to realize…and admit…that I was liked Draco, and not just because I was attracted to him either. I genuinely liked him," Harry said. 

"What flipped your lives over?" Jeremiah asked, almost afraid of the answer. 

"The war. Snape went missing for an entire week. It had never happened before, and by the middle of the second week we were really worried. I tried to get information from the Order, and that's what prompted the interrogation…" 

~September 10, 1996 - Order Headquarters~

"Harry…," Hermione started tentatively. 

They were all sitting around the fireplace at number twelve, Grimmauld Place. It was the Order of the Phoenix headquarters, and Remus Lupin's home, though originally it had belonged to the Black family. Harry, Hermione, Ron, Kingsley, Remus, Tonks and Moody were meeting as they always did once a week for private Order meetings. They did this because McGonagall did not want to share much information with Harry, Ron and Hermione, so these other Order members had decided to fill them in. Harry especially appreciated the gesture. 

Only now Harry wished he were anywhere else in the world. Okay, maybe not. I wish I were at the Shrieking Shack, Harry thought. He hadn't been there yet today, and he really wanted to find out if Snape had returned yet. However, Hermione seemed to have other plans. She had that 'don't-hate-me-but-I-have-to-ask' look on her face. Which never bode well for him. Or anyone, really. 

"Harry," Hermione continued. "We've noticed that you seem to be asking a lot of questions about Professor Snape lately." 

Harry put on his most blank expression. This is not good! "So?" 

"Well…we want to know why," Hermione said. 

Harry looked around at everyone, who were looking at him passively, though Ron seemed to look a bit guilty. Harry frowned. "Well, we haven't heard about him in a while. No one has seen him at any of the recent battles and I haven't dreamt anything about him lately either," he said, hoping his voice sounded normal enough. 

"That isn't all, Harry," Remus cut in. "You've had a lot of dreams concerning Snape lately, and now when we haven't heard anything, you're asking a lot of questions." 

Harry put on his defensive expression. "Well he has to be up to no good, if we haven't heard anything about him. What if he's planning something big with Voldemort?" 

"No chance of that," muttered Kingsley. 

Harry immediately locked onto it. "What do you mean?" 

Remus sighed. "Harry, we believe Snape might have betrayed the Dark Lord," he admitted. 

Harry didn't react at first, other than nodding, but when he realized everyone was staring at him expectantly he almost cursed himself. _Act surprised, idiot!_ He widened his eyes. "B-but he wouldn't do that! He's that bloody bastard's lapdog for Merlin's sake!" 

Hermione's eyes narrowed, and Remus and Ron were looking at him funny. Moody's fake eye was staring at him. Harry had to struggle not to look nervous. He covered his reaction by acting angry. "What makes you think he'd betray his master?!" 

"His potions have not been working correctly for months now. At first, we assumed it was because he had taken Draco Malfoy as his apprentice, but we have not heard of Draco in months. We think the two of them, Draco and Snape, were plotting to betray the Dark Lord. When the Dark Lord became suspicious, we Draco must have gone into hiding, and now Snape has joined him." 

Harry maintained his angry expression, but put in some confusion as well. _God I hope my acting skills have improved,_ he thought wildly. "How can you think that? He's probably helping that evil bastard with some big plan!" 

Hermione pursed her lips in thought, then gasped, drawing everyone's attention. She looked at Harry in surprise. "Harry…oh, no…you…don't tell me you…" 

Harry sat tense, eyes wide. Shit, she's figured it out! 

"You think Snape is on our side!" Hermione accused. 

Harry breathed out a sigh of relief before he could catch himself. Then he groaned. "Of course I don't. Are you bonkers, 'Mione?!" 

"But you've been having so many dreams of him lately, and you've been hiding something from us. Harry, we won't judge you if you think he's on our side," Hermione said. "Even Ron has suspicions, right, Ron?" 

Ron looked up guiltily and shrugged with a nod. Harry could tell he was only agreeing because everyone wanted him to. I can't jeopardize Snapes' cover. I just can't. But what can I say to them? Harry thought of Draco and the boy, hidden away in the Shrieking Shack. He couldn't keep sneaking food there, and the boy needed to be checked regularly. If Snape didn't make it back within the next week, what would they do? I have to get Draco and Jeremy somewhere safe, he thought, his decision made. 

~December 20, Future - Hidden Cave~

"Woah, hang on! Jeremy? The boy's name was Jeremy?" Jeremiah exclaimed, shocked. 

Harry nodded. "Yes. And before you ask, I have no idea if you were named after him. I don't even know if…I'm getting ahead of the story," Harry said. He grabbed the last chunk of bread and bit into it, chewing and swallowing. "Can I finish the story? I haven't got much more to tell." 

Jeremiah nodded, though his mind was racing to figure out when the first Jeremiah in his family had been born. There had been lots of them over the years. 

"I had made my decision. If Snape had been found out by Voldemort, or even the Ministry, Draco and Jeremy's hiding place would be jeopardized. It wasn't under the Fidelius charm. I had to get Draco and Jeremy somewhere safe, and the safest place I knew was the Order Headquarters. So I made up a story and fed it to them…" 

~September 10, 1996 - Order Headquarters~

Harry sighed and looked down guiltily, as though he were reluctant to give the information. He raised his head slowly and looked around at all the expectant faces. "If…if I tell you, you all have to swear you won't overreact. And you have to promise you'll listen to my idea, all right?" 

"Of course, Harry," Hermione agreed. Everyone else murmured their consent. 

"All right…um, it isn't Snape who I think is innocent. You remember a while ago, during that battle at Diagon Alley where I went missing for a while?" Harry asked. 

"That was about the time you kept sneaking away," Hermione commented. 

Harry nodded. "Yeah. Well, I found this boy who had been hit with the cruciatus…he couldn't have been more than ten. I couldn't help him, so I went to find someone to help me apparate him out. Only there were too many Death Eaters for me to avoid, so I went back to the boy, and I was shocked to find Draco Malfoy. I almost killed him right there, only I realized he was helping the boy. Draco pleaded with me. He wanted shelter, someplace to hide from the Death Eaters." 

"Harry, you didn't believe him!" Hermione exclaimed. 

Harry shook his head. "No, but I recognized the healing potions that Draco had. The boy really needed help, so I agreed to apparate him someplace, if he agreed to give me his wand. He did, and I took him someplace safe." 

"Where?" Kingsley immediately asked. He was the type who wanted information upfront. 

Harry shook his head. "I'm not saying until you agree to my plan. Draco gave the boy lots of potions, and then I tied him up. I snuck away to get veritaserum…I know, I shouldn't have stolen any," Harry said before anyone could reprimand him. "But I needed to find out if Draco was telling the truth. It turned out that he was. He didn't want to be a Death Eater." 

"I don't believe it, mate!" Ron proclaimed. 

"It's the truth," Harry insisted. "And he's been hiding out ever since. I've been helping him. He's the reason I had so much information, because his father used to tell him the plans. They helped, didn't they?" Harry persisted, looking imploringly at Tonks and Moody. 

"You told us they were dreams," Moody replied gruffly. 

"I know, but if I told you the truth you wouldn't have believed me. I don't want Draco interrogated. He needs to be kept hidden or he'll be killed." 

"What about the boy you say he was helping?" asked Tonks. 

"He's in a coma," Harry admitted. 

"Did you stop to think that perhaps the potions Malfoy was feeding him were making the boy worse?" Hermione asked. 

"We need to bring him here, get Poppy to look at him," said Remus. 

"And bring young Malfoy in," Kingsley said. "We need to find out what he knows." 

"I already told you almost everything he knows," Harry said. "And I won't bring him in, either of them, unless you all agree to keep it quiet and keep him safe," he added quickly, looking at all of them seriously. 

"We can't just trust your word, Harry," Tonks said, "not on something this important." 

"Fine, so long as I get to be there when you question him. I won't let you interrogate him about every little detail of his life," Harry protested. 

"No offense mate," Ron said, "but what the bloody hell made you want to even think about trusting Malfoy?!" 

Harry shrugged and didn't have to fake his sheepish expression. "We've just had a lot of time to talk. He's still a right git, and we still hate each other," that's a lie, "but…well, we're able to get along. And his information has been useful," Harry stressed. 

"I don't like it, mate," Ron sulked. 

"If agreeing to let you watch us…question…Mister Malfoy will have you bring him and the boy here, then so be it," Moody agreed. 

Ha, Moody will be all right but Tonks and Kingsley won't care about what I say. They'll interrogate Draco, Harry thought bitterly. But it's the best I've got, so I have to go with it. Until Snape returns…if he ever does…Harry drew himself out of those dismal thoughts. Why the man's disappearance upset him so much, he had no idea. It seemed that Draco wasn't the only one who had miraculously become important to him. 

Now, he just had to convince Draco. 

~ December 20, Future - Hidden Cave~

Harry stood and stretched with a yawn. "Couple hundred years worth of sleep, but I still feel as though I haven't slept in days," he aid. 

Jeremiah jumped up, all concern. "Maybe you should get some sleep. I could transfigure a bed for you," he offered. "While you rest I could go back to the castle and get some food and water," he added. 

Harry sighed, "I guess that would be best. I can't go to the castle yet, but I'm too tired to continue talking. A few hours rest should be good." 

Jeremiah nodded, then glanced around hesitantly. "Um…I don't want to leave you alone…" What if he disappears? Or something goes wrong and he dies again? Or, Merlin, what if someone finds him? 

"Worried I might just poof and vanish?" Harry asked wryly, startling Jeremiah because he had been thinking exactly that. 

Jeremiah nodded sheepishly. 

Harry smiled. "I think I'll still be here when you get back. Fawkes will protect me. Won't you, Fawkes?" 

The phoenix in question bobbed its head and ruffled its feathers in a very arrogant manner, looking at Jeremiah as though to say, of course! 

Jeremiah smiled despite his nervousness. "All right, then." 

After transfiguring the stone pallet that Harry had been laying on into a nice, fluffy bed and seeing to it that Harry was comfortable, Jeremiah climbed down from the cave. He checked to make sure the illusion was still up, and then because he wanted to be sure he would be able to find the place again he cast a spell that would allow him to find and track the coordinates of the cave. 

Walking back to the castle took much longer than he thought it would. With no beaten up magical car to drive him, it took an hour. He was tired himself by the time he saw the edge of the forest, and he hoped that Harry was still asleep. He didn't want Harry to be alone. 

It still wasn't quite registering that he had brought the Harry Potter back to life. He felt excited and scared and happy and just plain in shock. He had been waiting for this day for years now, but it was still shocking. And Harry was so much different than he'd thought he would be! 

_So much better. I knew he would be great; he's the savior of the wizarding world. He's a hero. But his story is just so amazing. It's so much different than what was put in the history books. How could they have gotten it all so wrong? It was true that Harry hadn't been around to tell it to everyone, but the stories in the textbooks were so vastly different from what Harry told him that it was hard to believe they could get it so wrong._

Jeremiah found himself inside the castle before he even realized it. He cautiously made his way to the kitchens, using the secret door by tickling the pear, as he had done many times before. Well, the 'secret' door wasn't really all that secret anyway. 

As he entered the kitchens, Jeremiah was unsurprised to find two house-elves waiting for him. The house-elves always knew when they were needed. They also never seemed to care if students were out after curfew, so Jeremiah knew he wouldn't be questioned, and his actions wouldn't be reported to his Head of House. He made the house-elves make a basket of assorted foods and cast a warming charm on the hot foods like the chicken and soup. 

Then he snuck back down to the Slytherin dorms and rummaged through his trunk for a change of clothes. Two thousand some-odd years in the same outfit has to be tiresome. I bet Harry would like some fresh clothes, without the bloodstains and holes, he thought. He tried to find something that Harry might like, and was disappointed that none of his clothes seemed right for the young man. He wanted Harry to be pleased by the clothing. He might just be grateful to have new clothes, Jeremiah reminded himself. 

So he grabbed his nicest, most comfortable sweater and soft trousers, then snatched his spare cloak. Shrinking everything except the food, he made his way back to the forest. As he walked through the forest, he found his thoughts traveling back to Harry, and he began to wonder what would happen next. How will everyone react to seeing him? he wondered. It was selfish, but Jeremiah found that he didn't really want anyone to see Harry. 

He wanted to keep Harry a secret. _They'll take him away. Test him, interrogate him, show him to the world like a carnival attraction. But from what he's told me so far, I don't think he'll enjoy it, and no one will care. And…maybe I'll never see him again._

Jeremiah stopped, startled by how much the thought upset him. He had been obsessed with Harry for so long, always thinking about what it would be like to meet him, talk to him. Now that he had, he never wanted to let that go. He wanted to keep Harry for himself. 

_But I can't. He isn't some sort of pet I can keep to myself. He's a person, a wizard, the savior of the wizarding world, for bloody sake! How can I even think to keep him to myself? Cursing his own selfishness and realizing that he had fallen, hard, for Harry Potter, Jeremiah shook his head. It doesn't matter. He doesn't even know me. I barely even know him…and I don't deserve him. No one does. He's too good of a person. For the first time ever, Jeremiah wished he really were Draco Malfoy._

_'Every Malfoy is either a Lucien or a Draconian, son.'_

Jeremiah sighed. He wished his father were right. He wanted to be the one Harry loved. Jeremiah had no doubt that the story Harry was telling him was one of love, between Harry and Draco. It wasn't an upsetting thought like Jeremiah had believed it would be, though. It seemed only right that Harry love Draco, after all the two of them had been through together. But still…how Jeremiah wished he were Draco. 

Shaking his head in annoyance at his own self-pity, Jeremiah began walking again. It didn't take too long before he was climbing to the hidden cave again, juggling a basket full of food as well. When he entered the cave, he saw Fawkes perched at the edge of the cave, watching the forest. Jeremiah smiled, "Looking out for him, eh Fawkes?" 

The bird cast him an annoyed look, but bobbed its head. Jeremiah grinned and made his way to the back of the cave. Harry was still asleep, laying on his side on the bed, one arm thrown haphazardly over the edge of the pallet and the other tucked at an odd angle under his chin. His wand hung loosely from the hand thrown over the side of the bed, and his lashes fluttered as he dreamed. 

Not wanting to wake him up - and also wanting to simply watch Harry sleep so peacefully - Jeremiah carefully set down the food basket and quietly transfigured one of the rolls into a pillow to sit on. With Fawkes diligently guarding the entrance, Jeremiah could relax and enjoy watching Harry sleep. However, it wasn't long before his own exhaustion took hold, and he too fell asleep. 

"Jeremiah." 

Jeremiah grumbled, then went back to softly snoring. 

"Jermiah." 

Still no response. 

"Jeremiah!" 

"Lemme 'lone," Jeremiah grumbled. 

"Oh, for heavens sake, you're just as bad as he is…JEREMIAH!" 

Jeremiah jerked, smacking his head on the stone wall behind him, then toppled over in pain, clutching his head. "Owww!" 

Harry leaned over Jeremiah, hands on hips. "It's your own fault for sleeping while sitting up." 

Jeremiah had to blink several times to realize what was going on. Then he did. "Oh! Harry!" he exclaimed, quickly sitting up. "I'm so sorry! I must have fallen asleep! Are you all right? Did something happen? Is everything—" 

"I'm fine, I'm fine!" Harry cut in, a small smile gracing his lips. "I'm actually quite hungry, but I thought it would be rude to take the food without asking," he added, then stepped back and gestured to the basket sitting on the ground. "May I?" 

"Huh? Oh, of course!" Jeremiah gushed, feeling like an imbecile. "Take whatever you want!" 

"Thanks," Harry said, and sat down, pulling the basket towards him. He opened it and grinned at the wide variety of foods, still hot and smelling delicious. "Hogwarts food…how I've missed you," he murmured. Then he grabbed a biscuit and a fried chicken leg and dug in. 

"So…" Jeremiah said after several minutes of nothing but the sound of eating. 

Harry swallowed the mouthful of mashed potatoes he had just stuffed into his mouth. "Sorry…I'm acting like a pig," he said sheepishly. 

Jeremiah shook his head vehemently. "No no no, not at all! I'm sure being, um, dead for so many years has to make you starved. Eat all you want." 

Harry wiped his hands of any crumbs and shook his head. "No, I'm okay now. If I eat any more, I'll probably be sick," he joked. "But anyways, you want me to tell you the rest of the story, right?" 

Jeremiah nodded. "Only if you feel up to it," he added, not wanting Harry to get the wrong impression. 

"I'm good for now. Where did I leave off? Oh, I remember. Well, of course Draco wasn't happy about it when I told him…" 

~September 10, 1996 - Shrieking Shack~

"How could you tell them?!" Draco shouted angrily. 

Harry winced. He had tried to explain things as calmly and quickly as possible, but Draco had exploded halfway through, and was now pacing back and forth angrily. "Draco, they want to help," Harry tried. 

"No, they want to interrogate me and use me as bait!" Draco retorted furiously, still pacing. "I can't believe this! You betrayed me - US!" he shouted, shooting a furious look in Harry's direction. 

Harry had nothing to say to that. No matter what his reasons were, he had betrayed Severus and Draco both. 

At his silence, Draco looked at him again and demanded, "What were you thinking?!" 

"I was thinking I wanted to protect you," Harry said honestly. "You and Jeremy both." 

"By telling the enemy?!" 

Harry felt anger spark. "They are not the enemy! You're on our side now and it's about time you remembered it, Malfoy!" 

Draco looked as though he had been slapped. He looked at Harry with wide eyes. For a moment, Harry thought he saw real pain in those eyes, but then the moment passed and the traditional Malfoy mask-of-cool was back. "You're right, Potter. I am on your side. But they don't know that, and if you think they will just let me waltz into their secret society without being interrogated and hexed, then you're as crazy as the Dark Lord," Draco stated calmly. 

Though Harry despaired seeing the guardless Draco disappear and the cool Malfoy return, he knew it was his own fault for becoming so angry and calling Draco by his last name. He hadn't done that in quite some time. Though he wanted desperately to apologize, he knew that he wasn't wrong. Neither was Draco, but the important thing was to get Draco and Jeremy to safety. 

"We don't know where Snape is, or what he's doing," Harry started. "What if Voldemort found out that Snape betrayed him? You admit yourself that you don't have much to say about Voldemort's plans, so even being interrogated you won't give anything away that I haven't already told the Order. But Snape has the location of this hideout. Snape knows almost everything that has been going on on both sides of the war. If he has been discovered, each day that he is interrogated brings him one step closer to the breaking point. He's good, we knot that, but he isn't perfect. He'll crack eventually, and then this place won't be safe anymore." 

Draco stopped pacing and collapsed onto the sofa. "There are things I don't want your…friends knowing about. My life isn't for display," Draco snarled in a very Snape-like manner. 

_The things he won't speak of,_ Harry thought. He had noticed that Draco never went into detail about his childhood or even life as a Slytherin. Granted, they didn't really talk much about anything other than the war and strategies, but the vague bits of information he had given away on occasion weren't very specific. Harry had never asked because he hadn't thought it was any of his business, and until recently because he hadn't cared. Now that he knew he did care, it still wasn't any of his business. 

"I know," he finally responded. "But they won't hurt you, and I made them swear that I could be there during the interrogation, and I can make sure certain questions aren't asked," he promised. 

Draco rolled his eyes. "Yes, because the Aurors take commands from you now," he snapped mockingly. 

"They will listen to me, Draco," Harry said fiercely. Draco's gaze snapped up to his, and Harry watched as slowly something seemed to relax in the blonde. It was like watching a stiffness just drain away from Draco's body, and even his gaze. 

"Okay, Harry. I'll go," Draco said calmly. 

Harry had, in that moment, a premonition. He pictured the two of them on the battlefield, Draco throwing himself in front of the Avada Kedavra to save him. That thought was terrifying to Harry. People were risking their lives for him every day, but did he want Draco to do the same? To give up his life for Harry? Absolutely not. 

~December 20, Future - Hidden Cave~

"The feelings were so extreme that I swore to myself that I would make sure Draco was as far away from me as possibly when I faced Voldemort. I kept that swear, too," Harry said. "But that's getting ahead of the story. I didn't tell anyone where Draco and Jeremy had been hiding, because I was afraid that if Severus did come back, the Order would capture him. I was sure that if McGonagall knew where I had been hiding Draco, she would put a guard on the place. 

"Before I took Draco to the Order, we spent an hour going over different questions that I would have to ensure weren't asked," Harry said. 

"How could you avoid questions about Severus?" Jeremiah asked. Any question he could think of would have led to a response that would reveal Severus Snape. 

"It was tricky, but we figured if Draco gaze a good deal of information about his father and Voldemort, they wouldn't ask about Severus. After all, they already had suspicious that Severus was either dead or had betrayed Voldemort, since no one had seen him in a while," Harry explained. 

"And what about the time training? They had to have asked about what you and Draco did in hiding." 

Harry nodded. "We decided that Draco wouldn't have to mention Severus if he was only asked about what he did. They had no reason to believe he was with anyone but myself or Jeremy, so they were unlikely to ask who he was with. I knew that it meant the Order would find out about what I did, and I knew they would never understand, especially not Ron and Hermione and Remus, but it was just one of the sacrifices we had to make. I figured that if Draco could torture himself every day, and give up his family and friends for what he thought was right, I could sacrifice my Golden Boy image," Harry said. Then he frowned at Jeremiah. "What is it?" 

Jeremiah looked a bit shocked. "It's just…all of this, none of it is in the history books. I'm just amazed that we got so much wrong." 

Harry sighed. "I'm sure that, after the war, the people needed a Savior just as much as they had needed one during the war. Even dead, I was probably seen as the perfect, innocent Golden Boy with such a pure heart that I had killed myself to save them," he said bitterly. 

Jeremiah bit his lip, feeling as though he had stumbled on a land mine. It was obvious that Harry had a lot of resentment toward his Savior title. "I'm sorry," he said. 

"It's okay. I guess even a century or two can't erase bad memories. Anyway, where was I?" 

"Um, you were going to bring in Draco for questioning," Jeremiah reminded him. 

"Ah, yeah. I remembered stories about Grindelwald and how Albus Dumbledore had been a hero of that war when he defeated Grindelwald. I remembered that many people thought, after the war, that Perhaps Albus was too powerful. That he might become corrupted, like Grindelwald. But Albus never showed any signs of Dark magic, and he was far too friendly and wise, so people left it alone, and eventually their suspicions disappeared altogether. 

"I knew that I wasn't that friendly, and thanks to Rita Skeeter and fellow students, the public already knew I had a temper. They even knew that I had, in the past, lost control of my magic. As soon as the Order found out I was practicing the Unforgivables, and had even mastered the cruciatus, I knew they would start to suspect I may become the next Dark Lord. That I may, even then, have begun to become corrupt. I needed to be smart and cunning to protect myself and Draco. 

"When I told Draco that I needed a plan, he came up with the idea. I didn't like it because it went against my Gryffindor ideals, but I knew it was our only option. I had the perfect bargaining chip with me already, even though it would make their suspicions stronger. I apparated us to the meeting point outside of Hogsmeade, surprisingly not far from the Shrieking Shack. McGonagall, Moody, Remus and Kingsley were waiting for us. I stuck to Draco like glue so that the Aurors knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I was there to protect Draco. I let them take his wand, but I didn't let them touch him." 

~September 10, 1996 - Just Outside of the Town of Hogsmeade~

"Where is the other boy, Harry?" McGonagall asked, a frown on her face. 

Harry felt Draco tense beside him, but Harry himself remained calm. Anger or hesitation wouldn't get him what he wanted. "I'm not bringing him just yet," Harry said calmly. 

Four narrow-eyed gazes turned to look at him coolly. McGonagall asked, "Why not?" 

"Because I can't be one hundred percent positive that you won't harm Draco unless I have something you want." 

Kingsley made something like a growling sound, but McGonagall raised a hand to calm him. She looked questioningly at Harry. "You are using the boy as blackmail?" she asked, her surprise evident in her tone. 

Harry was about to shake his head, but then realized that in essence he was using Jeremy as blackmail, so he shrugged. "I guess. I'll bring Jeremy after you've finished interrogating Draco. I want to make it clear that certain questions can't be asked, and when I say it's enough, you'll stop," he explained. 

The shock was evident in McGonagall's face; clearly the woman did not think he would ever do something like this. Moody looked at him speculatively, Remus looked even more shocked than McGonagall, and Kingsley had a vein throbbing on his forward but appeared otherwise calm. 

"Harry, what's wrong with you? The boy needs medical attention immediately," Remus said, disbelief in his voice. 

Harry shook his head. "Jeremy is fine. His condition hasn't changed, and a few hours won't make any difference." 

"You would be willing to risk the boy?" McGonagall questioned, flabbergasted. 

"It isn't a risk," Harry said firmly. "It's a means to an end. I want Draco safe, and I'm not stupid enough to let your Aurors run amuck in his head," Harry said, voice cold. "Either I control the interrogation, or I apparate us right back into hiding, and this time I'll stay with them," he added. 

They hadn't discussed that last bit, and Harry could sense Draco's surprise. It had been an impulsive decision on Harry's part. One that he wasn't even sure he truly meant. That didn't matter, though, because all that was important was if they thought he meant it. Which, it appeared, they did. 

"Very well," McGonagall said. 

Harry watched as something closed in McGonagall's gaze. It was much like watching a door swing shut slowly. She doesn't trust me anymore. She's begun to think of me differently, he thought. Sacrifices. This is what I have to sacrifice, he reminded himself, lest his will break and he feel the pain of knowing he had lost the trust of his friends and comrades. And it would only get worse, once they found out about that. 

McGonagall turned to Draco. "Mister Malfoy, I am the Secret Keeper to where you will be staying with Mister Potter," she began and Harry had to force himself not to flinch when he was called 'Mister Potter' instead of 'Harry.' "The terms of your stay under our protection is that you undergo thorough questioning under the influence of veritaserum. You will be questioned by Shackelbolt," she nodded to Kingsley, "and Nymphadora Tonks, two of our Aurors. 

"The questioning will be viewed and," she cleared her throat, "supervised by Mister Potter. You will remain under house arrest and will be under the constant surveillance of an Order member, usually an Auror. Your wand will be confiscated. Our protection only extends so far as the time which the war ends, after which time you will be charged with any and all crimes you have committed. If you at any time harm or threaten a member of the Order, you will be arrested and brought before the Ministry by our Aurors. Is this an acceptable arrangement?" 

Harry looked at Draco. The blonde seemed calm, relaxed even, as he nodded. "Yes," Draco said. 

McGonagall nodded. "Good. I expect you to be on your best behavior and not try our patience. Now, you will side-apparate with Shackelbolt to the Headquarters. This is the address," she said, handing him the paper. Now he would be able to go to number 12 Grimauld Place, but he would never be able to tell anyone else about it. "Mister Potter, I trust you can get yourself to Headquarters without difficulty." 

When they arrived at number twelve, Grimauld Place they had an audience waiting for them. Hermione, Ron, Tonks and Pomfrey stood by the door. None of them seemed very happy, of course. Pomfrey looked at Harry expectantly. 

"Where is the boy?" she asked. 

"There has been a change of plans," McGonagall said calmly. "The boy will not be brought here until we are finished questioning Mister Malfoy." 

"I knew it!" Ron exploded. "The rotten bastard tricked Harry!" Ron took a threatening step toward Draco, but Harry moved closer to the blonde, half-blocking him. Ron looked surprised. "What're you doing, Harry?" 

"It was my decision not to bring Jeremy with us," he answered. 

"What? Why?" Hermione immediately questioned. 

"To prevent everyone from abusing Draco during the interrogation," Harry stated calmly. 

Ron and Hermione looked astounded, and Tonks looked bemused. Of course, it was Ron who was the first to speak up. "Abused? Harry, he's Malfoy!" 

"Yes, I figured that out myself," Harry said, a small smirk gracing his lips. 

Ron sputtered indignantly, clearly at a loss for words. Hermione had that speculative look on her face. Pomfrey had that sour, I'm-not-happy look which she directed at Tonks. "Well then, stop dawdling and go question Draco! I want young Jeremy here within the hour!" she commanded. 

Of course, Pomfrey being Pomfrey, the issue was quickly dealt with. No one ever ignored orders from the mediwitch, and Harry found himself appreciating that. The woman may not seem like a big player in the war, but she had more control over the Order than he originally thought! McGonagall led a fuming Ron and annoyed Hermione out of the room, the other adults following until only Harry, Draco, Tonks, and Shacklebolt remained in the hall. 

"Follow me," Tonks said, all-business. 

They three of them followed her down to the basement, which Harry noted was still cluttered, though most of the things in the room had been moved to one side, leaving the other side free for a couple of uncomfortable chairs. This, Harry knew, was where all prisoners were grilled for information by the Order before being turned over to the Ministry. It was damp and dusty and smelled funny - basically, it was the cliché interrogation room. Only there wasn't a spotlight on the chair in the middle, where Draco was told to sit. No, wizards had no use for electricity. Instead, Tonks used Draco's wand to shine the light in his face. 

Draco flinched at the brightness and tried to look through it to Harry. Harry, realizing the problem, shifted his chair so that he was off to the side, where Draco could look over at him without the light blinding him. Harry gave Draco a reassuring smile, and was please to see the blonde relax a bit. 

Shacklebolt took a small bottle out of his clock pocket and addressed Draco. "Mister Malfoy, you will now be administered three drops of veritaserum. After which, you will be thoroughly questioned by myself and Tonks...and Mister Potter," he added when Harry cleared his throat. He shot Harry a slightly threatening look before unstoppering the bottle and taking the eyedropper out. Draco obediently opened his mouth and stuck out his tongue when instructed, and the three drops were administered. 

The questioning began with the basics - name, birthdate, are you loyal to the Dark Lord, etc. It was when the questions began to get complicated that Harry sat tensely, waiting to jump in if a question were too personal - or about Snape. Draco, for his part, seemed calm as always. Everything seemed to go great, better than either of them had thought it would. Draco had little information to offer that wasn't what Harry had already told them. 

Then, of course, came the questions Harry feared. 

"Were you trying to help the boy when you found him in the alley?" 

Oh, shit! Harry thought. He couldn't field this question, and the answer had to be honest. They were screwed. 

"Yes," Draco said without hesitation. 

What? He didn't even care about Jeremy! Is the veritaserum not working? That's impossible! Harry thought. 

"Why?" 

"Because he needed my help and I had to prove I was not loyal to the Dark Lord." 

"Where did you go after—" 

"Stop!" Harry jumped up, startling the two Aurors. "Don't ask him anything about the location of where I took him." 

Shacklebolt pursed his lips in annoyance as he looked at Harry. "And why not?" 

"It is a safe location. Should anything happen, I want it to remain so," Harry explained tersely. 

"For Mister Malfoy?" Tonks asked slowly, as though the question were very important. 

Harry shook his head. "No, for myself." 

"You're safe here," Shacklebolt said. 

"For now, but who knows what will happen later. I trust everyone here, but anything can happen when you least expect it. I've learned that much from this war," Harry said, a touch of bitterness slipping into his voice. 

Tonks's expression softened in compassion, and Shacklebolt seemed to look at Harry with a bit more respect and less annoyance. He nodded. "Very well," he agreed, then turned his attention back to Draco. "What did you do while you were in hiding?" 

Harry sat back down, relaxing. This was a question they had prepared for, and Draco answered it the way they had agreed. "I trained, helped Harry train, and watched over Jeremy. I also ate, slept, used the loo—" 

"That is enough," Shacklebolt interjected smoothly. Harry was shocked by just how honestly Draco had to answer. It was kind of funny, actually. It wasn't so funny when Shacklebolt continued the questioning. "What kind of training did you and Mister Potter participate in?" 

"War training," Draco answered. 

Shacklebolt rephrased his question. "What specifically did you do during this training?" 

"I would succumb to cruciatus and try to throw it off," Draco responded. 

The air got thicker at his statement. Harry could practically hear the wheels turning in Shacklebolt and Tonks' minds as they worked it out. Then Tonks asked, softly, "Who cast cruciatus on you?" 

"Harry." 

There. The silence that accompanied the statement was tense with the expectancy of an explosion. Harry waited, and waited and waited. Shackelbolt turned a stone-cold glare in his direction. Tonks seemed at a loss for words, as though still trying to muddle through the information. When she finally did, she said quite calmly, "I don't think the veritaserum is working." 

Well, Harry hadn't expected that kind of a response. Yelling, sure. Anger, definitely. He was so surprised by Tonks' statement, though, that he couldn't stop the startled snort of laughter. The disbelief on Tonks' face turned to confusion, but Shacklebolt kept staring at him as though he were ready to attack at any moment. 

"He's not lying," Harry said. "He's telling the truth. We've been practicing the cruciatus." 

"Harry!" Tonks said in astonishment. "Why would you do that? What has happened to you?" 

There it is. The distrust. Sorry, Tonks. "Because I needed to know how to cast it," Harry replied as calmly as he could. 

"Why would you need to know an Unforgivable?" Shacklebolt asked in a growl. 

"I felt that it was necessary," Harry answered, struggling not to panic. It was far more difficult to lie about this than he had thought it would be. He had learned to be numb enough to cast cruciatus without flinching, but he quickly realized he was not numb enough to purposefully make his comrades hate him. 

"Harry, why would you ever think it was necessary?" Tonks asked. 

Harry took a deep breath and repeated the speech Snape had given him. "I was thinking about it for a while. I stunned people in battle, but what happens to them afterwards? They were taken for interrogation by our members, or the Ministry Aurors would get to them first to do who knows what to them, or the Death Eaters would take them and they would be tortured and maybe even killed. 

"I've been ignorant, but when I saw Jeremy and realized that he could have been taken by another Death Eater had I left him there, I knew I couldn't be ignorant any more. I couldn't just leave people behind, hoping they have the good luck to be taken by the right people. I had to take responsibility." 

"Using the cruciatus to torture your opponents is your way of taking responsibility?" Shacklebolt growled. 

"No…cruciatus was just a preparation. A way to make myself numb, so I can kill without distraction," Harry said quietly, the wordsavada kedavra hanging heavily in the air. 

"So now you wish to be a killer?" inquired Shacklebolt, his tone quiet, reminding Harry greatly of the calm before a storm. 

"I'm sure he didn't mean it that way, Kingsly!" Tonks said quickly. "Harry, you know I would have helped you. Any one of us would. You didn't need to learn Dark Arts to properly defend yourself!" 

"I know how to defend myself, but how do you think I'll kill Voldemort? You all want me to do it, expect me to do it, but I wasn't a killer! I don't even know how to cast the Killing Curse! I can't go through this war without any deaths on my hands! I learned that a long time ago, and it's about time I start evening the playing field." 

Harry stared hard, determinedly, at the two Aurors. "You can't tell me you haven't killed in this war." 

"Harry, you shouldn't have to do this—" Tonks began. 

"No, I shouldn't. I shouldn't have to do a lot of things but it doesn't matter now. I'm fine with what I'm doing, what I'm going to do. It's my responsibility, and more than that, I want to do this. So don't judge me for wanting to be prepared," Harry said. 

Tonks sighed. "You could have come to us. We could have helped you. You didn't need to learn to…to torture people." 

Harry didn't believe it. No matter how much they relied on him to bring down Voldemort, they still didn't want to share information with him and like Tonks just admitted, they wouldn't have taught him what he really needed to know. What Snape and Draco had taught him. Besides that, he himself never would have thought of it until Snape had told him. 

"Maybe, but Draco was there. He wanted shelter, so it was the perfect exchange. I provided shelter, and he provided training." 

"And I am to believe that Mister Malfoy would allow himself to be tortured for a boy whom I understand he has had much ugly history with?" 

Though Shacklebolt didn't direct the question to Draco, the blonde answered. "Yes." 

Shacklebolt glanced at him rather dismissively. "Why?" 

"Because I also wanted to learn how to throw off the cruciatus." 

"So that we could not torture you?" 

"No, so that if I was taken back to the Dark Lord I might have a chance to break free," Draco answered calmly. 

"And can you throw the cruciatus?" 

"Yes," Draco said. His eyes flashed pride, and Harry could almost picture him smiling. It was the first show of emotion that he had given during the interrogation, and Harry was happy to see it. 

"Are we done now?" Harry asked. "I think you've questioned him about everything." Except Snape, thank Merlin. 

"We will speak to McGonagall. You may stay here to guard Mister Malfoy, if you wish." 

"Well, I'm not leaving him by himself in this house, Harry thought sarcastically. 

~*~December 20, Future - Hidden Cave~*~

"Wow, that was…really close," Jeremiah said. 

Harry nodded. "Yes. We were very lucky they were distracted by learning about the cruciatus. I think if not for that, they would have gotten around to asking about Severus. And, surprisingly, Tonks seemed to understand my reasoning," Harry added with a smile. 

"What about the others? Did they understand too?" Jeremiah asked, hoping they had. He felt like a kid being told a fairy-tale story. He was sure the suspense building was leading to the climax soon, and he was waiting eagerly. 

Harry laughed bitterly. "Hardly. Of course Minerva was pissed, and Lupin was rather nervous, but Ron and Hermione went nuts. I'd never seen Hermione go so crazy.l It was like she was afraid, truly afraid, for me…or maybe of me. Ron, well…it goes without saying that he went berserk. Or um, I guess it doesn't go without saying since you don't know Ron but let's just say he had quite the temper. 

"He even tried to strangle Draco before anyone could stop him. In the end, after much shouting and screaming, when Draco looked like he couldn't take any more insults without reatilating, Minerva suggested I take him to my room while she spoke to everyone. I got him upstairs before Ron figured out that it was also his room…" 

~*~September 10, 1996 - 12 Grimauld Place~*~

As soon as the door was shut, Draco exploded. "When I get my hands on that bloody Weasels' neck I'll show him how to strangle!" 

Harry locked the door, then decided to silence the room as well. Then he went to his bed and lay down on it, watching Draco pace back and forth across the room. Harry couldn't help grinning foolishly as Draco ranted and raved with very decorative language. It was quite some time before Draco finally exhausted himself and stopped pacing. When he looked over, Harry grinned even more, causing Draco's scowl to turn fierce. 

"You think this is funny, Potter?" 

Harry shook his head. "No. I'm just really, really proud of you. You didn't get all pissy out there. You kept your cool." At the thunderous expression he got from Draco, Harry went on to say, "I mean it, Draco. You were perfect. Um, I mean, you acted perfect…ly," he stammered lamely. 

Draco didn't look any more pleased, but he did not and say, "Thank you," rather stiffly. He glanced around the room and scrunched his nose at the gaudy red and gold quilt that Mrs. Weasley had made for Ron' bed. "The Weasels', I presume?" 

"Try to think of him as a human, please. And yes, that's Rons' bed." 

Looking at the bed in question as though it were contaminated, Draco curled his lips in disgust. "I'm not sitting on tht." 

"So don't," Harry said, shrugging. 

"There aren't any chairs n here," Draco pointed out. 

"You could sit on the trunks," Harry suggested. "Or, you know, there's always the floor." 

Draco sneered. "I do not sit on floors. Or trunks. Move over," he ordered, pushing Harry over on the narrow twin bed. With a huff, Draco settled down to stare up at the ceiling in silence. 

Harry was still smiling as they lay in companionable silence. He wasn't even aware of how close their bodies were, how their thighs were pressed against each other. That was until Draco sneezed, jostling them both. That was when it became obvious they were touching, and he felt himself tense, unsure whether to slide over and risk falling off the bed or offer to sleep on Ron's bed. 

Draco saved him the trouble by sneezing again. "Stupid dusty old crappy house," he grumbled irritably. 

Harry frowned and rolled onto his side to face Draco - which had the added benefit of putting some space between them. "You didn't have a problem with the Shrieking Shack," Harry commented. 

"Snape spelled the air in there clean, so my allergies wouldn't bother me. This place is disgusting," Draco said disdainfully. 

"This place is my home," Harry said quietly, staring at the pillows rather than looking at Draco. "Sirius - my godfather - left it to me when he died. I let Dumbledore use it for the Order, but I had hoped to turn it into a home after…all this war stuff." 

Draco turned on his side facing Harry. "I'm…sorry. I'm sure it will be a nice…quaint house when the war is over." 

Harry smirked. "You're saying that because right now I'm the only one in this quaint house whose on your side." 

"No, I'm saying it because I mean it. I never lie to flatter someone. This house was part of the Black family household, if it belonged to Sirius Black. My mother's relatives had to have good taste. I'm sure a few dozen coats of paint and a thorough scrub down and…hm, new furniture, will bring it back to its former glory," Draco mused, glancing around the room. 

Harry glanced around the room himself, trying to picture the walls a different color, the wooden floors polished to perfection and brand new furniture. He shook his head. "I don't see it." He looked back at Draco, who was staring at him. Feeling self-conscious suddenly, Harry asked, "What?" 

Draco seemed to weigh his words before responding, which made Harry even more self-conscious. "Well…I could help," Draco said slowly. When he got a perplexed look from Harry, he hurried to explain. "I mean, after the war. When you fix it up. I could help you…with the paint and furniture, I mean." As Harry's gaze turned to that of surprise, Draco felt foolish. "I'm just…god at that stuff. Interior design." 

Harry saw the embarrassed flush on Draco's face, but was too stunned at the implications to figure out what to say. When Draco suddenly rolled over so his back was facing him, Harry finally said something. "I'm sorry, I was just surprised. I didn't know what to say." 

"It's okay. Forget about it; it was a stupid idea," Draco muttered. 

"No, it wasn't," Harry said immediately. Why am I suddenly so nervous? Why is my heart racing? "It was a good idea, Draco. I…I'd really like that. I mean, I could use the help," and it would give me a reason to see you, "and I don't know anyone with a knack for decorating," and I really want you around, "and, you know, if you don't have any place to go after all this you could um, stay here," forever, "until you find someplace else," Harry finished, face red and heart racing. Oh, god, what possessed me to say that? And what was I thinking? He's going to take it the wrong way! I don't even know what way is the right way to take it! Just what did I mean?! 

Draco was silent for so long that Harry thought he just might die of embarrassment. Then Draco finally muttered something, but Harry couldn't hear it over his pounding heartbeat. "Say that again?" he asked. 

Draco cleared his throat and spoke louder this time, still not facing Harry. "I said…that sounds okay. I mean, I'll have Malfoy Manor but I…think I may want to stay away from there for a while. Until, you know, the Ministry gets done with it, since I'm sure they'll want to raid it. And of course, if father is still around…and mother, too. It'll take a while for things to cool down. I guess I'll need someplace to stay and since I don't hate you anymore…I suppose it wouldn't be too difficult to stay here for a while. But of course I'll make myself useful by helping you fix this place up, because I won't be indebted to you." 

By the end of that speech, Harry was grinning like a loon. He leaned over Draco to see that the blonde was blushing, which made him even happier. Draco startled when Harry braced one hand on the other side of the blonde, then he rolled onto his back to scowl up at Harry. "What are you so happy about, Potter? I only said I'd help you fix this place up. It's not like I'll be doing any manual labor." 

Still braced with one hand on either side of Draco, Harry's grin turned to a smirk. "I don't hate you anymore either, Draco." 

Draco's eyes widened slightly. Harry became thoroughly aware of the position they were in, and thoughts of their last kiss swarmed through his head, causing his face to heat and his gaze to drop to Draco's lips. If he leaned down, they would kiss. He knew Draco wouldn't object to it, thought that Draco wouldn't object to more than kissing, which he had been thinking about quite a lot recently. He was just about to succumb to the urge to lean down when he realized with a jolt where they were, what was happening just outside the room. 

He quickly drew back, taking deep breaths to calm himself. "I'm sorry," he said quickly, embarrassed. 

Draco lay very still, a peculiar look in his eyes. He didn't say anything, and the tension grew thick. Harry ran a hand through his hair in nervousness and made an inarticulate sound of annoyance. "I should go see if everyone has calmed down yet," he said. Draco nodded, and Harry continued. "But um…later?" Harry asked, blushing. I have no idea what's come over me. Ron's right, I've gone completely bonkers. 

Draco didn't visibly relax, but Harry saw the tension leave his eyes. Draco smirked. "All right, later. I'll hold you to that, Harry." 

Blushing furiously, Harry hopped off the bed and took the silencing spell off the door, and both he and Draco jumped at the sound of shouting and banging at the door. 

"…blow this door down, Harry!" bellowed Ron. "I'm warning you, that mangy ferret better not be touching my stuff!" 

Harry looked at Draco apologetically. To think he had asked Draco to think of Ron as a human earlier. Draco raised a brow, then mouthed weasel. Harry rolled his eyes and opened the door, raising his brows in surprise when he found himself facing Ron's wand. 

Ron yelped in surprise and quickly lowered his wand. "'Bout time!" he exploded, pushing past Harry to get in the room. He positively seethed at the sight of Draco. "If you touched any of my stuff I'll hex you into tomorrow!" Ron swore. 

"Oh, don't get your balls in a twist, Weasel. I wouldn't dream of touching any of your filthy hand-me-downs," Draco sneered, sitting up on the bed. 

"Draco," Harry warned. Draco huffed and crossed his arms, but didn't say anything more. 

"You—" Ron started. 

"Ron!" Harry cut him off with a stern look. 

Ron looked at Harry in surprise, but it quickly turned to a look of angry contemplation, or as close to contemplation as Ron could get. "I don't know what's going on here, Harry, but if Malfoy didn't do anything to you, then you've really changed." 

Harry had no doubt Ron thought the change was for the worst. "Draco didn't do anything," Harry said quietly. 

"That's good to know," Hermione said primly as she came into the room. "Professor McGonagall wants to talk to you, Harry," she added. "But first, you have a lot of explaining to do." 

Harry nodded, dreading the inevitable conversation. Hermione closed the door and walked over to Rons' bed, sitting down on it. Ron sat next to her with a huff, still glaring mutinously at Draco. As Harry sat next to Draco, he noticed with a bit of humor that they were suddenly divided into two sides. 

Hermione, always the one to take control, looked at Draco with contempt and said bluntly, "I don't want you here." 

Draco sneered, "I don't want to be here, so I guess we have something in common." Then he muttered, just low enough that only Harry heard, "much to my utter disgust." 

Hermione nodded as though she had expected that response, clearly unaware of the other words, and turned her sharp gaze to Harry. "Lying about the boy, not telling us about seeing Malfoy, and even giving him protection I may have forgiven. I wouldn't have understood it, but I would have trusted you were doing what you thought best. But," her expression turned to one of pain, "the cruciatus, Harry? That I will not - can not - ever forgive. How could you?! After everything you've seen, everything Voldemort has done, how could you sink to his level?!" 

Harry visibly flinched, and Draco shifted slightly, tensing, as though he were about to pounce if Harry told him to. Harry shook his head, cutting right to the heart of the matter. That's just the way she is. "I felt that it was necessary," he managed to say. 

"Bloody hell, you're mad!" Ron exploded. "And it's all your fault!" he added, accusing Draco. 

"Stop blaming Draco!" Harry exploded, glaring at the both of them. "It's not his fault! For Merlin's sake, what does he have to gain from letting me torture him every day? What does he gain from abandoning Voldemort and taking sanctuary from me when I could have just handed him in to the Order any day?! Well?!" 

"W-well he's a sick bastard!" Ron retorted. "No one can make sense of his twisted mind! It could just be some sort of big plan to earn your trust and infiltrate the Order and kill us all!" 

"He was under veritaserum," Hermione snapped at Ron. "He's not loyal to Voldemor and he doesn't want to hurt Harry." She looked at Harry. "I don't care if you trust Malfoy. If he's on our side, that's fine. In fact, it's great if he gave you all that information you passed on to the other Order members. What I do care about is why you thought it was necessary to learn the cruciatus. We don't deal with the Dark Arts, Harry. You've always believed in that." 

Harry shook his head. "No, I haven't. For the past few months, as the battles kept getting worse, I knew we were losing because we - I - couldn't do what needed to be done. We can't just keep defending ourselves and capturing prisoners of war. We need to attack. I couldn't attack before. I didn't have the ability, even though I hated them all, the Death Eaters. I needed to be able to numb myself from what I was doing and…I found that. I learned it. I can cast the cruciatus on someone I don't hate, someone I…consider a friend. I can cast it without hesitation, without emotion. That's what I needed." 

"He's…he's Malfoy!" Of course you can torture the blighter, he deserves it!" Ron spat with a menacing glare towards Draco. 

"He's doesn't!" Harry shouted right back, shocking Ron. "Just listen for once, Ron! He's not the same person we went to school with! He's been with Voldemort, has seen what the bastard does, and he knows it isn't right!" 

Hermione looked like she was about to cry. She sniffed, then wiped her eyes to prevent herself from crying. It drew everyone's attention immediately, and she said, her voice wobbly, "Oh Harry, I'm so s-sorry!" 

Ron and Draco were gobsmacked at her reaction. Draco, of course, had expected nothing of waterworks, and Ron couldn't believe she was apologizing. Harry, however surprised he was, managed to ask in utter confusion, "For what?" 

"E-everything! All the things you have to do...everything you've seen…I-I never thought it would come to this, Harry!" This time the tears did escape, and the three boys were at a loss for what to do. "Th-the cruciatus and the k-killing curse, it's just awful! I n-never thought…I didn't know…I just always thought Dumbledore would be here for us and n-now you have to do this, and I feel so worthless! All the spells and everything I've studied…it's just worthless when I think about what you've done…what you will do…I just always wanted to help!" 

"Her-Hermione!" Ron stammered, dismayed at seeing her crying so hard. 

Draco shifted uncomfortably on the bed, utterly at a lost. Harry bit his lip, just as dismayed at Ron was. He said, "Hermione, no, it's all right. You've been a great help already! If it weren't for you, I would have died in my first year at Hogwarts, when I had to pick that potion…I never would have made it this far without you. I wouldn't be half as prepared as I am now if you hadn't drilled me on spells and read all those books…making me and Ron study…it really helped, Hermione. You can't think that you didn't help!" 

"But I d-don't know the Unforgivables. I w-would never be able to cast them! They're horrid!" 

"I know," Harry said quietly. "They're awful…and when you cast one, and see what it does…it's enough to make you sick. Enough to make me sick. But…I needed it, you know? I couldn't cast them, even if I wanted with all my being to kill Voldemort, I know I wouldn't be able to say the words. And now…I just needed a different teacher, for this. I needed someone who isn't kind, isn't book-smart and wonderful in every way," he said, thinking of Snape. 

He continued, "I needed someone with experience and a cold heart. You're wonderful, Hermione, but like you said, you couldn't cast an Unforgivable no matter what. And I wouldn't want you any other way. Either of you," he added, looking at Ron. "You're my best mates, you've been with me through everything. I don't want either of you to have to go through with this. It wasn't meant to be your burden. It was meant to be mine, from the moment Voldemort failed to kill me, and every time he failed after that only proved it. I'm meant to kill him, and I will." 

"Oh, Harry!" Hermione cried and threw herself at him, arms going around his neck as she sobbed against his shoulder. Harry wrapped his arms around her back and rubbed his hand in soothing circles up and down her spine until she calmed down. She pulled away with a sniffle, rubbing her face on her sleeves, her cheeks rosy with embarrassment. Eyes still watery, she nodded. "Then I'll…I'll find more protection spells. Better ones. Stronger ones. So when you face him, he won't be able to lay a single spell on you!" 

Harry smiled. This was more the Hermione he was used to: determined and stubborn. "Thank you, Hermione. That will really help," he said honestly. Cautiously, he looked at Ron, who seemed to have been subdued by Hermione's explosion. "Ron?" he asked hesitantly. 

Not looking at anyone, Ron murmured, "I expect she'll need help. And you'll need someone watching your back, you know, 'cause those Death Eaters are sneaky bastards…they'll try to get you from behind." 

Harry smiled with relief. "Yeah, I expect they will." 

Ron looked up suddenly and glowered at Draco. "But don't expect me to trust you or anything. I'll watch Harry's back here too!" 

Draco looked offended, but instead of defending himself, he merely nodded, lips pursed to refrain from making a comment. 

"Well then," Hermione said, standing and wiping the last of her tears away. "Professor McGonagall wants you to come down, Harry. She says that Malfoy can stay up here. Come on, Ron," she added, leading a sulking Ron out of the room. 

Harry let out a breath he hadn't known he was holding. He smiled and looked at Draco, who was still pursing his lips. "That wasn't nearly so bad as I expected," Harry said. 

"Stupid Gryffindor sentimentalities," was all Draco said, but he put a grin on Harry's face as he left. 

~*~December 21, Future - Hidden Cave~*~

"Things blew over after that. I brought Jeremy to the Headquarters and Poppy assured us that our suspicions had been right, and Jeremy was just in a coma. She told us he would wake up when he was good and ready to face the world. After what he had been through, I didn't blame the kid for wanting to stay locked inside himself, but I hoped he would decide to come back out soon. 

"Minerva wanted to keep Draco locked under Auror surveillance in one of the spare bedrooms, but when I volunteered to share a room with him she reluctantly agreed. She basically told me in no uncertain terms that Draco would be my responsibility. What I was most surprised by was how calm Draco was acting. He didn't put up a fuss or anything, which was completely out of character for him. But, after an uncomfortable dinner where everyone was pretty silent, he vented in our new room. 

"I was fine with just listening, offering an ear rather than injecting my own comments. He seemed to appreciate it. After he exhausted himself, we lay on our respective beds and just talked quietly about Severus and Jeremy until we both fell asleep," Harry finished. 

"Wow…Hermione seems pretty scary, actually," Jeremiah said. 

Harry grinned. "Yep. You should have seen her when finals were coming up. She'd go study-nazi on us," he said cheerfully. 

Jeremiah shuddered. "Oh, now that's scary." 

Harry laughed and agreed. 

Jeremiah found himself grinning, happy to see Harry happy. "So, what about the promise of 'later'?" he asked, hoping his tone was light. 

Harry smirked. "We were too tired that night. And we completely forgot." 

"Oh." Man, I'm making an out of myself, Jeremiah thought. He just couldn't seem to hold his tongue around Harry. 

Harry stood and stretched with a yawn. "Do you mind if we take a walk? My legs need some exercise." 

Jeremiah looked up the length of those long legs from his vantage point on the ground, admiring how in-shape they seemed enough from years of inactivity. That must have been one hell of a stasis spell, he thought. When his gaze met Harry's and saw Harry smirking down at him, he blushed furiously. There I go again, making an ass out of myself! He jumped up, flustered, and nodded quickly. "Yeah, um, a walk is a good idea," he agreed, adding silently, so I can freeze my bum off and hopefully cool my head…and other parts of my anatomy. 

Harry didn't say anything about Jeremiah's strange behavior, which Jeremiah was immensely grateful for. Instead, Harry looked at Fawkes. "Fawkes, are you going to stay here? I can't imagine you haven't found yourself a new home in all these years." 

Fawkes made a shrill sound and flapped his wings indignantly, then bobbed his head. Jeremiah had no idea what the bird was trying to say, but Harry seemed to understand. "You can't stay with me, Fawkes. I don't even know if I'm staying," Harry said. 

Something within Jeremiah's chest clenched, and it felt like he couldn't get enough breath in his lungs. "You aren't staying?" 

Harry bit his lip before answering. "Let's take that walk now," he finally said, quietly. 

Jeremiah nodded, gulping past the lump in his throat. He couldn't bring himself to say anything, and his thoughts were in such turmoil that he couldn't figure out what he was thinking, exactly. So he followed Harry silently, and helped him climb down the rocks, and then followed Harry through the forest. Harry didn't seem to have a particular destination in mind. It was more like he was just wandering aimlessly to enjoy the fresh air. 

"It smells nice here," Harry said after a while. "Peaceful, almost. I remember once I was terrified of the Forest." 

"There aren't that many dark creatures in here anymore," Jeremiah responded, thankful to have something to say. "The centaurs and unicorns still live here, of course, but the giant spiders were relocated when they became endangered, and the other creatures seem content to remain in here without ever disturbing the people living outside the Forbidden Forest." 

"Oh, Aragog's family was endangered? Must have been after Hagrid died," Harry said thoughtfully. 

"Aragog?" questioned Jeremiah. 

"The giant spiders. Well, one of them. He was Hagrid's pet. Hagrid was gameskeeper when I was here. He had a habit of taking in the most dangerous creatures for pets. Gave them ironic names, like his three-headed dog named Fluffy." 

Jeremiah chuckled. "Fluffy, huh? Bet he was fun to play fetch with." 

"Nah. He'd sooner bite your arm off than play fetch. Unless you played him music, then he'd go right to sleep." 

"They let him keep that as a pet?!" Jeremiah asked incredulously. 

"Well, at the time he was put to good use guarding a secret door. I just had the misfortune of running into him during my first year," Harry said. "They took him away after that, though. Hagrid was really crushed." 

Jeremiah hummed sympathetically, and then they fell into comfortably silence again, walking side by side through the forest. It was dark, of course, but he knew it was probably close to dawn, which meant it was the twenty-first now. One whole day had passed, but it seemed like so much longer. He didn't know how long it was until Harry spoke again. 

"It was a while before we became lovers," Harry suddenly said. 

Jeremiah could have yelped, he was so surprised. It took him a moment to realize who Harry was talking about, and then he said, "Oh." 

"We messed around a lot, experimenting, never really admitting to what was going on. I was still confused, and Draco seemed content not to talk about what we did at night. I still went out on missions with the Order, and when we got back, after Poppy ensured I was all right, Draco would wait until we were going to bed before ensuring himself that I really was all right. 

"At first, I convinced myself that Draco was just horny or…something. I didn't want to think about him caring for me, or vice versa. But eventually…it just happened. I woke up with my head on his chest, his arm around my shoulders, and I knew I cared about him. I mean, I had already knew I cared about him but…I just didn't realize how much until then. After that, it was all right to say sappy things like 'I want you' or 'I missed you' or anything else. It was all right to say them, and it was all right to hear them. 

"Draco would never do anything until I did it first. I think he had already learned to accept what was happening, and he was okay with waiting for me to accept it," Harry finished. 

"That's…," _really, really making me jealous_ , "really cool. Did anyone else know?" Jeremiah asked curiously. 

"No. I have no idea if they ever figured it out. If they did, no one ever mentioned it, or gave any hints." 

Jeremiah nodded. "So what happened to Severus? I mean, he didn't just disappear since…well, he was at the final battle. And everyone trusted him to help Poppy try to save you, right?" 

Harry nodded. "Yeah. It was a few months before we heard anything from him. By that point everyone had come to relax around Draco, even if they didn't particularly like him, and with the relaxation Draco was able to speak his mind more without fearing he'd be kicked out or something. We would go to the basement and use it to train, though we never talked about it to anyone. The general consensus of the house was to ignore the fact that we were practicing Dark Arts. 

"Well, it came to the point that whenever Ron and I went out to relax and fly on our brooms for a bit, Draco was allowed with us. Without his wand, of course. Minerva and Remus were going to Hogsmeade to buy some supplies and the three of us tagged along - Hermione opted to stay and help Mrs. Weasley clean up the house, which had gotten to be pretty messy. Anyway, Ron got distracted by Zonko's, so Draco and I wound up wandering on our own. Hogsmeade, at that point, was one of the few 'safe' towns left. Probably because it was so close to the school. 

"As we wandered, we saw the Shrieking Shack. We both stopped to stare at it, and then we looked at each other, and silently agreed that we were going in. We flew to the place leisurely, but once inside, we practically ran up the steps to the bedroom, as if propelled by some compulsion. As if, fully expecting to find Severus waiting for us. And, well…he was. Only I doubt he was doing it on purpose. He was laying on the floor in front of the hearth, his wand loosely grasped in his hand, his body seemingly relaxed. But we knew at once that something was wrong, because Severus did not sleep on floors." 

"Oh no, what was wrong with him?" Jeremiah asked, caught up in the suspense. 

"He had been tortured," Harry said bluntly. "Tortured and nearly killed. I fetched Minerva while Draco watched over him. I didn't care that our hideout would be discovered because Snape didn't deserve to die, no matter what a bastard he was. I filled her and Remus in as we rushed back to the Shrieking Shack. Of course, they were shocked that I had lied to them so thoroughly, but they managed to wait until after we got Severus back to Headquarters to yell at me and Draco. 

"We told them the entire truth then, and believed us, thank goodness, without the use of veritaserum. Poppy tsked and huffed over the state that Severus was in. She wouldn't let us near him for an entire month! But when he regained consciousness, and told Minerva and Moody and everyone what had happened to him, we were finally allowed to see him. He looked perfectly fine, really, if a bit grouchy. He seemed relieved to see that we were all right. 

"Apparently, Voldemort got everything from him except the location of the Shrieking Shack. He didn't escape, he was set free in the hopes that he would lead them to the Shack. What neither he nor they knew was that he had a portkey, which activated as soon as he was off the premises of Voldemort's hideout. It was in the sole of his shoe, of all places, and he had taken the memory out of himself to ensure that not even he would know it was there," Harry said with a grin. 

"What? That's…genius, actually," Jeremiah said in wonder, then laughed. "In his shoe. Probably the last place anyone would look for a portkey!" 

"Hey, my first travel with a portkey was with an old boot," Harry said, then laughed. "But you're right. Severus is…was such a stiff man that no one would have expected him to do that. He himself was so surprised to be yanked by the portkey that he had fallen and knocked himself unconscious. That, combined with the effects of prolonged torture, put him into a nice little coma." 

"How come he woke up before Jeremy?" Jeremiah asked. 

"Because Severus is not one to lie about for long periods of time," Harry said dryly. "He would never allow himself to be in a coma for long. Jeremy was just a little boy, though. A scared little boy, so he didn't know or want to get out of his coma yet. In fact, I have no idea if he ever came out of the coma," Harry said. 

"You…you don't know? He was still in a coma when you died?" Jeremiah asked, astonished. 

Harry nodded, a bit sadly. "Yeah. I…I really hope he was okay. I never knew him or anything but…it was like Jeremy was what brought Draco and I together. Like without Jeremy, none of what happened would have happened. He was what connected us all together, Draco, myself and Severus." 

Jeremiah nodded in understanding. It must have been odd, to know you owed everything to a little boy in a coma. "So then what happened?" 

"Severus was interrogated of course, under veritaserum, and confirmed everything he had already said and everything we said as well. He was given his wand, which infuriated Draco to no end, of course. Severus was also allowed on missions with us, further infuriating Draco, who was always left at Headquarters. It was actually pretty amusing to see Severus and Draco sniping at each other every night. I often teased them about acting like father and son," Harry said, a wistful smile on his face. 

"They sound like they were," Jeremiah agreed. 

"I think Severus wanted to adopt Draco, after the war. But obviously, that didn't happen…" Harry's voice trailed off. 

"Why?" Jeremiah asked suddenly, startling Harry. "Why did Severus kill himself?" 

Harry sighed and shook his head. "I don't know. It wasn't part of the plan. He was only supposed to steal my body right before I was going to die and put the stasis spell on it, then hide me and leave the clues, take Draco and go into hiding himself. It's what we agreed on." 

"Draco agreed to that? To you killing yourself?" Jeremiah asked incredulously. 

"No…Draco didn't know anything about the plan. He didn't…I…Severus thought it would be better. If Draco didn't know. Because by then…well…we were in love. I knew it, he knew it, I think maybe everyone knew it, actually. We just never said the words out loud…I wish we had…" Again Harry's voice trailed off, and sensing that Harry needed some time, Jeremiah remained silent, following Harry wherever he went. 

They found themselves at the edge of the forest, facing the large field that was in front of Hogwarts. They both stopped, and Harry stared out at the castle, the grounds, everything. The field was covered in a light speckling of snow, and the air was a bit colder without the close proximity of trees all around them. It sent shivers down Jeremiah's spine. 

"She looks different," Harry whispered. "Different but…the same. You know?" 

Jeremiah looked at Harry in confusion and followed his gaze to the castle. "Oh. Um…yeah…they tried to rebuild it exactly as it was but…" 

"I know. They aren't as good as the Founders. There were secrets in that castle that no one knew about, probably never will know about," Harry said softly. "I'm just glad…mine was uncovered." 

Jeremiah did that gulping thing again, his chest tightening painfully. He was suddenly filled with sadness. _It's close, isn't it? He'll leave soon. But where will he go? And…why? Why can't he stay? With me?_

"The castle was attacked in December. December twentieth, to be exact. The battle lasted…I don't know, actually," Harry said, an odd expression on his face. "I know it had only been a day before I killed him, and then myself. Did the battle last much longer after that?" Harry asked, looking at Jeremiah. 

Jeremiah felt like his chest was being crushed. "No," he managed to gasp out. "Just…a few hours." 

Harry nodded and looked back out over the field again. "Good. I was hoping it would end with me. Voldemort would die, I would die, and then the war would stop, just like that. But I suppose a few hours is okay, too. What time is it?" Harry asked. 

"Huh?" Jeremiah fumbled for his wand and cast tempus, and the wavering numbers _5:48_ hung in the air for a minute before disappearing. 

"Hm…about twenty minutes, I guess," Harry murmured. 

"Twenty minutes?" Jeremiah repeated stupidly. 

Harry nodded. "I think I died at six o'eight. I could be off by a few minutes, though. It's kind of weird, standing here, so close to where I died, on the same day I died just thousands of years later…at the same time. Like déjà vu, you know?" 

Jeremiah suddenly burst, "But you're not going to die!" 

Harry shook himself out of his musings to look at Jeremiah, who seemed a bit panicked. Harry offered a small smile, "No, I won't die this time." 

Jeremiah let out a huge breath of relief. "Well…good. That's good," he said weakly. 

"So, the end of the story is that I killed Voldemort, pierced my own heart with the Gryffindor sword, and died. From there, I can only assume Severus did as we agreed and then killed himself, for reasons I may never know." 

"But that isn't the end," Jeremiah said. Harry looked at him, and he persisted, "It isn't the end. Hundreds of years later I found clues, and then I brought you back to life, and now your story starts again." 

"Hm…I suppose you're right," Harry said with a smile. "I suppose that was book one…and this, book two. The hero can't really die, can he? Not even a self-righteous Gryffindor hero who committed suicide." 

"Right," Jeremiah said, relieved that Harry wasn't going to do…well, he didn't know what he had worried about for a second there. "Right. The hero can't die that way. He needs a 'happily ever after.'" 

Harry looked out over the field again, his gaze pensive once more. "The only question is, which is happily ever after?" he murmured, almost to himself. 

"What?" Jeremiah asked in confusion. 

Harry took a deep breath and turned to face Jeremiah. "Okay, book two. I'm at a crossroads, right now. The part of the story where the hero chooses the path that has the most adventure and danger in store, with a happily ever after promised to him at the end. Only, I don't know which path leads to that happily ever after." 

"I…I don't understand," Jeremiah said, feeling lost. 

Harry knelt down and tugged off one of his shoes. He ripped the sole out and tugged two shiny gold objects out, then put the sole back in and stepped back into the shoe. Jeremiah watched this with confusion. Harry straightened and held out the objects. One was on a chain, and it took a moment for Jeremiah to realize what it was. It was a primitive time-turner. His stomach did flip-flops. He looked at the other object. It was a Slytherin house pin. 

"What…" 

"The pin is a portkey," Harry said softly. "It was Draco's pin, actually. He has…had…my Gryffindor pin. Probably the closest thing to declarations of love that we ever did. Severus made it into a portkey. It will take me to the exact spot I died." 

"And…the time-turner?" Jeremiah whispered, fear clenching his gut. 

"A regular old time-turner. But…if I activate the time-turner and portkey together, they will take me back to the exact time and place that I died. Or…any time after or before I died, in that same spot." 

_No_ , Jeremiah thought desperately. _Don't leave. Not after everything I've done. Not after all of this, don't leave me!_

~~~~*~~~~

**You decide.**

Part Four: Losing Him - Go to Chapter 4

Part Four: Keeping Him - Go to Chapter 5

This is a choose-your-own ending. The choice you make affects how the story ends. Read one, or read both. You get to choose.


	4. Part IV: Losing Him

### 

Losing Him

"I need to go back," Harry continued softly. "There are things I need to do…things I need to say. I can't leave it like this."

Jeremiah gulped, his eyes wide and glassy, but he couldn't say anything. He was paralyzed by fear and understanding.

"Thank you for everything you've done, Jeremiah. I need to go now but…I won't ever forget you. Don't think I will, okay? I don't know what will happen…time traveling is dangerous enough without the added element of traveling several hundred years into the past. I wish I could spend more time here, with you, but…" Harry looked out over the field. "I just feel like now is the only time I can go."

Harry looked back at Jeremiah and stepped closer to him. "Thank you. You'll never know how grateful I am, Jeremiah." He leaned up and kissed the frozen Jeremiah on the cheek, then stepped back. He looked at Jeremiah with concern. "Are you going to be alright?"

Jeremiah was about to hyperventilate. He just knew he was. Yet, somehow, he managed to nod. The hyperventilating would come any minute now, he just knew it, he knew it…

Harry stepped back again, then turned around and walked out onto the field. He seemed to be searching the grass for something, and then he stopped suddenly. He stood there, so still, that Jeremiah finally gasped and his legs unlocked and he ran out onto the field just as Harry raised his hands and began spinning the time-turner.

"No!" Jeremiah shouted. "Wait! Harry, please!" He cried, his voice echoing across the otherwise silent field. Tears streamed down his cheeks. No, don't leave! Don't go! Just barely…he was almost there…just…a little…he reached out for Harry's back and…

He fell.

"No!" he yelped, immediately pushing up from the ground. There was a splinter in his palm, but he really didn't care. He looked around in confusion. He was sitting in the middle of the field in front of the castle. His bum was getting wet from the snow on the ground, and his cheeks were wet. He raised his hand and swiped at them, and they came away wet with tears. He was crying.

"Mister Malfoy! Mister Malfoy!"

Jeremiah looked up to see the Headmistress running towards him, with Professor Binns floating at her heels. Both looked surprised to see him there. Not half as surprised as I am to be here, he thought insanely. "What?"

"What are you doing out here? We heard screaming!" the Headmistress demanded with worry in her voice.

"I…" Jeremiah thought. He couldn't remember why he was out here. "…don't know?" he finished hesitantly.

Professor Binns looked around as though in a daze. "I saw…I thought I saw…no, no, it couldn't have been…" he was muttering.

"Oh dear, you must have hit your head. Come, we'll get you to the infirmary," the Headmistress said.

Jeremiah frowned but nodded, pushing to his feet. Don't leave! Jeremiah shuddered. Was that his voice he just heard? He shook his head. He must have really hit his head.

"I really….thought I heard him say…thought I saw…" Professor Binns murmured.

~*~September 1, Future - Malfoy Manor~*~

Jeremiah sighed as he closed the journal. I could read this a thousand times, and still never tire of it, he thought.

"Reading that old thing again, Jeremy?"

Jeremiah looked over at his dad, who stood in the doorframe of the library. He smiled sheepishly at having been caught. "Yeah."

Jeremiah's dad shook his head. "I'm going to have to hide that thing from you."

Jeremiah pouted. "But I want to read it!"

"You have it memorized. You even quote it sometimes," his dad said wryly. He walked over to the sofa and sat down next to his son and plucked the journal from his grasp before Jeremiah could protest. "This," he waved the book for emphasis, "is very important. It's the only thing that—"

"Kept our family from persecution after the war," Jeremiah finished, having heard it a thousand times or more.

His dad rolled his eyes. "Yes, I know, you've heard it all before. I've never asked you, son, but why do you read this journal so much?"

Jeremiah eyed the journal and shrugged. "I don't know. I just…it's like when I open it up, I'm reading the most important thing in the world. I feel like I know exactly what it says in there."

"Because you've read it over a thousand times," his dad put in with amusement.

Jeremiah shook his head avidly. "No, even before then. It's like…it's like I was there when he wrote it. I get this feeling…like there's something I'm forgetting. Some important fact that should be in the journal, something he purposely left out…"

"You mean the missing pages, don't you?" his dad asked with a sigh. "I've told you, I don't know where they are."

Jeremiah nodded. "I know. He tore them out for a reason. He didn't want us to know something."

"How do you know he was the one to tear it out? It could have been anyone. After the war—"

"The house was torn apart. I know, dad," Jeremiah said. "But I know that he was the one who tore it out. He did it on purpose, to keep me from finding out something."

His dad rolled his eyes again. "Because he knew, hundreds of years later, you would be reading it."

"Exactly," Jeremiah said with a nod, as though it made perfect sense.

His dad sighed and shook his head. He put the journal back on the table and stood up. "Get ready to leave, your mother and I want to get you on the train early this time."

Jeremiah nodded. He had already packed his luggage, and was eager to go to his seventh year at Hogwarts. His final year. He smiled at the thought of graduating, but then looked at the journal again. Suddenly he was reminded of the Christmas break last year which he couldn't remember. He had hit his head and no amount of magic could get him that missing day and a half back. He had always wondered why, and now he wondered why the journal reminded him of it.

Shaking his head at the straying thoughts, he picked up the journal and went to his room, lovingly wrapping it in a velvet cloth and tucking it into his trunk. As he lugged everything downstairs, he thought about how his father was right, that the journal really was important. The writings of Harry James Potter, savior of the wizarding world, had saved his family from persecution when the Revolution was over.

The journal had told of Harry's story, from year one of Hogwarts to the day he committed suicide…and then the day that he came back from the dead, just popping back into existence at the very spot he had died, two days after his death and the disappearance of his body. They told the story of Draco Malfoy, Jeremiah's great-great-great-great grandfather. Harry and Draco had lived together for years and adopted a boy they had saved during the war, whom Jeremiah was named after.

"I have no idea if you were named after him…”

Jeremiah stopped abruptly in the middle of the stairs. Where had he heard that voice before? Why did those words pop into his head so suddenly? Suddenly he felt like he had lost something very, very precious to him. He felt like he wanted to cry. He shook his head resolutely and continued down the stairs. He was probably just sad to know that this was his last year at Hogwarts.

~*~December 20, Future - Hogwarts Castle~*~

Being his last year at Hogwarts, Jeremiah and most of the seventh years had decided to stay at the castle for Christmas. Hogwarts was truly beautiful during Christmastime, the house elves outdid themselves every year. Was it just his imagination that this year was the most beautiful of all? Dinner had been served over an hour ago but there were still a few stragglers in the Great Hall, chatting and lazily eating the food that was still on the tables. Jeremiah was laying on one of the benches at the Slytherin table, staring up at the enchanted ceiling. It had started to snow outside, and the ceiling reflected the weather outside. Fat, fluffy snowflakes were falling from the star speckled ceiling, disappearing just above where hundreds of floating candles hovered high above their tables. Lazy, dark blue clouds, shining with light from the moon were drifting across the scene.

“Y’alright, Malfoy?” 

Jeremiah tilted his head back to look up at his best mate and nodded. “Yeah, just thinking.”

“Anything in particular you got that brain wrapping around tonight?”

Shaking his head, Jeremiah returned his gaze back to the enchanted ceiling. “Nothing really. Just that it’s real beautiful tonight.”

His friend rolled his eyes, then reached out to flick him on the forehead. Jeremiah hissed at the light sting, glaring up at him, but his annoyance was quickly overshadowed by a familiar smile. “Okay yeah and I’m also thinking about what day it is.”

“One year to the date from the day you went crazy and lost an entire day’s worth of memories?”

“I think you mean one year to the date from when he gave himself a concussion so bad that even St Mungo’s couldn’t figure it out,” piped a cheerful female voice from across the table.

Jeremiah sat up to glare at the bushy redhead Ravenclaw. “It wasn’t a concussion! I didn’t have any injuries.”

“Yes because that makes it so much better that you just spontaneously lost your memories.”

“I don’t know what the big deal is, it’s not like I lost all of my memories. Just that day,” Jeremiah grouched as he grabbed an apple tart from the center of the table.

“It’s just bizarre, mate. Anyways, I’m heading down to the common room. You coming?”

Jeremiah glanced at his best mate, then at the girl across the table, before shaking his head. “Hm, no, I think I’ll stay here a little while longer.”

“Alright. You going back to your dorm? I’ll walk you first,” the boy offered to the Ravenclaw girl.

Her cheeks turning just a slight bit pink, she nodded and gathered her bag up. Jeremiah smiled at the sight. Know-It-All Melanie Weasley and goofy but loveable Cameron Longbottom. If anyone had told him in his first year that the two of them would end up together and the three of them would be the best of mates, he would have laughed. But here they were in seventh year, the two of them having been dating since fifth year.

As he watched them leave the Great Hall, he felt a stab of longing in his chest. His thoughts went back to last Christmas, spent in St Mungo’s, his parents worried sick that he’d gone mental. The mediwizards couldn’t explain his memory loss, couldn’t find it anywhere in his mind. He was a medical mystery. Other than a tiny lingering sense of paranoia that he forgot something, he felt fine. Okay maybe tiny paranoia wasn’t the right word. It consumed him almost constantly, but he tried his best to forget about it.

He wiped the crumbs off on his trousers and got up. He wasn’t sure where he was going, but he just started walking. It wasn’t long before he encountered Binns, the history professor. “Hullo, Professor Binns.”

“Ah! Young Mister Malfoy. I’m glad I have run into you. Today is the one year mark of the day you lost some memories, yes?”

Jeremiah had a very strong hunch that Binns never forgot anything, which was likely why he had held the position of history professor for who knew how many hundreds of years. Regardless, he nodded. “Yeah.”

“You know, the strange thing about being dead is that I have an astonishingly good memory, and try as I might I cannot forget when we found you wandering the school grounds. Just before you took your fall, I saw you talking to someone. I could have sworn it was...well, nevermind that. It’s preposterous of course. However later on upon thinking about it I realized that many years ago I was told something strange by a student of mine. He said that should I ever witness something impossible, I should have a look in the Room of Requirement. Mind you, I’ve no idea what he was on about. However, it occurred to me today as I’m reminded of the day I witnessed something impossible, that the message may not have been for me.”

Jeremiah stared at the professor in confusion. Where Binns was ordinarily very concise with his words, to the point where he droned on with such a lack of emotion that it was hard to pay attention, his words now made absolutely no sense to Jeremiah. He frowned at the ghost, “Um. Okay?”

“Yes well, now that I’ve delivered that I think I’ll see how the Great Hall is looking with the snow. Good day, and good luck, Mister Malfoy,” Binns said as he floated past Jeremiah.

Jeremiah watched the professor disappear around a corner, more than a little confused. What was that about? The Room of Requirement? He’d never heard of such a room. What had Binns witnessed that was impossible last year, and what did it have to do with him? He couldn’t shake a strange pulsing feeling in his veins, nor the persistent nagging in his mind that he was forgetting something which reared up with a vengeance. 

He felt jittery and started walking again. He didn’t know where he was going, but he found himself veering away from the dungeons where his common rooms were and instead up a flight of stairs, then up another. He was halfway down a corridor when he noticed that the portraits were murmuring. He glanced at the one nearest to him on the left, a landscape portrait which he was certain was not supposed to have a good number of wizards and witches in it, staring at him and whispering to each other. His paranoia was definitely warranted now. Suspicious, he glanced at other portraits down the hall. Nearly all of them were crowded and the people in them were staring at him as though expectantly. 

“What?!” He exploded, glaring at the portraits. Like no one had ever wandered aimlessly through the castle before? The people in the nearest portrait startled at his shout, and quickly scattered to join portraits that weren’t at close. The whispering continued though, and he shook his head. “Look I don’t know what you’re all worked up about but I don’t appreciate you following me around the castle.”

Of course then it hit him, the castle. Who would know more about the castle than the portraits? They saw the comings and goings for centuries. Surely they would know where the Room of Requirement was, if it existed. Some of the crowds from the closer portraits were starting to disperse after his outburst, but he called out, “Wait! Do you know where the Room of Requirement is?”

A man wearing a most ridiculous hat turned back to Jeremiah. A woman tugged on his sleeve but he whispered something to her and then made his way to the landscape closest to Jeremiah. “Yes, I know where it is.”

“Where? I...uh...I was told something I’m looking for is there.”

The man smiled, “Yes, I believe it is.”

“Can you tell me where the room is?” he asked with mild annoyance.

“Across from Barnabas, I believe.”

This is why no one talks to portraits. They’re utterly useless. Aloud he asked, “Can you be more specific? I’ve got no idea where that is.”

“Barnabas resides on the seventh floor corridor. And might I suggest you think about what it is you are looking for?”

“As if I’ve done anything else for the past year,” Jeremiah grumbled as he turned from the portrait and headed towards the stairs. Four flights of stairs later - two of which changed direction on him midway causing him to double back - he finally found the right corridor. Barnabas, as it turned out, was a very large tapestry. And across from it...was a blank wall. There was no room. Jeremiah swore softly as he glared at the stone wall, hoping magically a door would appear. Nothing did, and after a few moments he felt foolish standing there glaring at it. Why had the portrait led him there? Why had Professor Binns given him that strange message? Why did they all insist he keep thinking about the lost time he was trying so hard to pretend he wasn’t constantly thinking about?

_And might I suggest you think about what it is you are looking for?_

That’s what the portrait had said. To think about what he was searching for. What did that mean, though? Jeremiah began pacing as he mulled it over. Was he supposed to have thought of it on the way up? Or was he supposed to stare at the wall and think about it? Was the walk supposed to have helped him figure out what he was looking for? He wasn’t even sure what he was looking for! He just felt like something was _missing_. He’d felt that way for a year now and nothing could shake the feeling that he _had_ to find it. If he just knew where to look…

Jeremiah stopped pacing. He looked at the tapestry. Perhaps…? He pulled the edge of the tapestry away from the wall. Behind it, there was nothing. No hidden passage as he’d hoped. Disgusted, he let it fall to the wall again and turned to leave. And there, right in front of him on the opposite wall, there was a door. A door that had definitely not been there moments ago. In awe, Jeremiah reached for the handle, turned it, and pushed it open. He stepped through, into a large room filled with...junk. It was literally everywhere, heaps of random stuff that wound through the room. There was furniture, books, lamps, jewelry, clothing; nothing was organized and it looked as though everything had been left there for ages.

Was this really what he was supposed to find? A room full of...discarded junk? How was anyone supposed to find anything in here? Yet oddly, his heart was pounding in his chest and he felt as though he was right there on the edge of discovering something massive. There were narrow, winding paths through all the junk, and his feet carried him down one path before he could even contemplate which direction to take. He walked until he reached a fork and randomly picked another direction, barely glancing at everything he passed. If he could just find...whatever it was he was looking for. He _knew_ he would know what it was if only he saw it. He was about to turn down another branch in the path when he saw it. Dusty, taped to a brown-wrapped rectangle perched on top of an old sofa. An envelope with his name scrolled on it in elegant cursive. _Jeremiah_.

His hand was shaking slightly as he pulled the envelope off the package and opened it. Inside were several pages worth of parchment, the edges of one side ragged as though they’d been torn from a book, save for the topmost page. The writing on them was as familiar to him as his own handwriting. These were the missing pages from the journal of his ancestor, Harry Potter. _Of course_ , he thought, _this is what I’ve always been looking for. All those years, reading that journal over and over again._

How did the pages end up here, though? With his name on the envelope that held them? He smoothed the parchment in his hands. The top page was not torn from the journal, he was sure. Moreover...it was addressed to him.

_My dearest Jeremiah,_

_I debated on how to do this. By the time I was old and gray and I knew I wanted to write my story down, I knew also that to do so would mean drastically altering the future. A future that would bring you into my life. I suppose I worry that to change things too much would also change you too much, and I quite liked you the way you were. This may never even reach you but...on the chance that I haven’t altered the timeline terribly, I wanted to be sure you would find this. If you’re reading this, it means you have, and I am so very grateful for it._

_Hermione told me if you did eventually read this, the odds were high that you wouldn’t even know what happened. But I decided it was worth the risk, because you risked a great deal for me. You see, Jeremiah, you saved my life. These pages I’ve left you from my journal...these are the bits of history that won’t see the light of day for over 300 years. No one will know what you did for me because it broke so many wizarding laws...and because to tell them would alter the course of the future too much. I’m not really sure about that, but Hermione insisted and well, I don’t remember a time she’s ever been wrong. Oh, I do hope you’re friends with her descendant, Melanie. You told me you didn’t talk to her much but I hope perhaps by my surviving, it’s brought the branches of our family closer together._

_Ah, but I’m rambling. Let me start from the beginning. You see, I died after the Final Battle of the Revolution. It all started when…_

Jeremiah read on. At some point, he sat on the dusty sofa beside the large brown package. He read through the letter and then all twenty of the missing pages. Pages that told of how Harry Potter died, and was brought back to life by a clever boy at Hogwarts. Him. His story. Harry Potter lived because Jeremiah saved him. It was like a dam had been broken in his chest. Tears were carving marks down his cheek by the time he finished those pages. The last page, like the first, was not torn from the journal.

_So that’s it, Jeremiah. That’s how you saved my life. I wanted to tell everyone. I wanted it to be a story passed down through the generations of my family. I wanted you to grow up knowing you were MY hero. But I also know that by returning to my timeline, you might not even be born, or perhaps the Jeremiah that is born won’t be the same one who saved me. Perhaps I altered time so much you don’t even exist. But if you do, and you’re reading this...thank you. Thank you for everything and I can’t wait until we speak again._

_With great fondness,_

_Harry James Potter-Malfoy_

_P.S. Open the package._

Jeremiah wiped the tears from his cheek. He looked at the package. It was large and almost flat, rectangular in shape with simple brown paper and twine wrapped around it. He set down the papers and reached out to undo the twine. The paper tore easily off, and what he saw had fresh tears streaming down his cheeks again.

The portrait of Harry Potter, gray-haired with round spectacles, startled to attention from slumber. When the portrait locked eyes with him, it smiled, wrinkles forming at the eyes.

“Hullo, Jeremiah. You’re a sight for sore eyes. What took you so long?”

Jeremiah laughed through his tears, “I didn’t know what I was looking for.”

_**Fin.** _


	5. Part IV: Keeping Him

### Keeping Him

"I need to go back," Harry continued softly. "There are things I need to do…things I need to say. I can't leave it like this."

Jeremiah gulped, his eyes wide and glassy, but he couldn't say anything. He was paralyzed by fear and understanding.

"Thank you for everything you've done, Jeremiah. I need to go now but…” Harry looked at Jeremiah and stepped closer to him. "Thank you. You'll never know how grateful I am, Jeremiah."

Jeremiah was about to hyperventilate. He just knew he was. Yet, somehow, he managed to nod. The hyperventilating would come any minute now, he just knew it, he knew it…

Harry stepped away from him, then turned around and walked out onto the field. He seemed to be searching the grass for something, and then he stopped suddenly. He stood there, so still, that Jeremiah finally gasped and his legs unlocked and he ran out onto the field just as Harry raised his hands and began spinning the time-turner.

"No!" Jeremiah shouted. "Wait! Harry, please!" He cried, his voice echoing across the otherwise silent field. Tears streamed down his cheeks. No, don't leave! Don't go! Just barely…he was almost there…just…a little…he reached out for Harry's back and…

He fell. "Ouch!" he yelped, immediately pushing up from the ground. There was a splinter in his palm, but he really didn't care. He looked around in confusion. He was sitting in the middle of the field in front of the castle. His bum was getting wet from the snow on the ground, and his cheeks were wet. He raised his hand and swiped at them, and they came away wet with tears. He was crying.

_I can't believe he's gone. I can't believe...I just...he'll come back. He just needed to do something. He'll come back, he will._

Jeremiah sat on the field for a long time after that. He couldn't bring himself to go back to the castle, not even for food. He couldn't bring himself to tear his gaze away from where Harry had disappeared. He remained there for the entire day, until it was once again dark. His eyes were sore, he was swaying on his feet, and Fawkes had come and gone quite some time ago though he couldn't remember exactly when. His stomach growled loudly in protest, and he couldn't resist a yawn.

He admitted defeat. Harry wasn't coming back. Why had he thought he would? Harry had Draco to return to. Harry and Draco were probably living the happy life right now. They probably had already lived a happy life by now, as Harry was back in the past…where he belonged.

Jeremiah fought back tears. He got up and spun around and began walking back to the castle. It's better this way. He's happy now. I don't even know why I'm crying…Merlin, I'm so pathetic…I barely even knew him…he doesn't even know that I love him, and it's better this way…he kept thinking, over and over. Before he knew it, his footsteps had found him inside the castle. The few staff and students that had stayed for the holidays were likely already in bed. Filch was probably roaming the halls.

As Jeremiah passed the library, he paused. In the past, he thought. There had to be something written about Harry! Something new, because Harry had changed the past, because Harry lived! Jeremiah rushed into the library and went straight for the texts on the Revolution. He found the one that documented Harry's life and opened it up.

He scanned through the text, not finding anything had changed. When he reached the part where Harry committed suicide, and Severus Snape hid his body away and erased his own memory of where he had hidden it before returning to reveal he'd stolen Harry's memories to testify for Draco, he admitted defeat yet again. Harry had never ended up with Draco. Everything was the same as it had always been. Maybe Harry had chosen to go into hiding instead, or maybe he never even made it back to his time. Maybe the time travel _was_ too difficult. Maybe he just...vanished.

The thought left Jeremiah feeling as though he’d cry. All that he’d done to save Harry could have been for nothing. Harry didn’t get to live out his life like anyone else, didn’t get his happy ending. He put the book back. And he couldn’t tell anyone, because there was no way they would believe him. He retreated to his room in the Slytherin dorms.

~*~1997 - Hogwarts Grounds~*~

Harry fell to the ground with a terrible feeling of nausea. His head pounded and his vision was blurred. It took several long minutes for him to catch his breath and feel like he wasn’t going to hurl his stomach up. When he could finally bear to open his eyes, he saw that he’d landed exactly where he’d left. He looked behind him, but Jeremiah wasn’t there anymore. He’d made it back. He was suddenly hit with a wave of sorrow as he thought about the boy who’d saved his life. Would Jeremiah remember, or would their time together be erased now that he’d gone back in time? He’d never really understood how time travel worked, but he was sure Hermione would have plenty of theories.

On shaky knees, Harry stood up. He turned to face the castle. It was dawn, and the early light on the ruins of the castle was eery to look at, but confirmed that he had landed in the right time. He could see people bustling about, even this early. Perhaps working on repairs? Would they be working on them so soon after the battle? He didn’t know, but he did know he didn’t want to be seen. Not yet, anyway. He turned away from the castle and began walking towards the forest. If he’d appeared when he’d wanted to, then it was the day Severus Snape brought Harry Potter to the cave. The day Severus Snape died, the only other man who would know what had really happened.

Harry couldn’t let Severus die, not like this. He walked until his legs weren’t jello anymore, until he reached the base of that small mountain. He looked up towards the cave, invisible to his eyes. So Severus had already hidden it. He hoped that didn’t mean he was too late, and began to climb. He was about halfway up when he saw a figure appear from what looked like the rocks. A very familiar figure. He grinned, “Professor!”

Severus Snape froze on the ledge of the cave, staring down in absolute shock at the form of Harry Potter. It was probably the only time Harry would ever catch Severus off-guard. The older man opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again and asked in astonishment, “Potter?”

Harry hurried up the rest of the way, and Severus stepped back into the cave to give him room to climb onto the ledge. When Harry straightened, he found a wand pointed between his eyes. It didn’t lessen his grin any, “It’s me, Professor. It’s really me. You did it. You helped someone save me.”

Snape had narrowed his eyes to slits, and without hesitation pushed himself into Harry’s mind. The boy didn’t bother to block him, letting the man in with ease. Letting him see _everything_. The truth about what happened. When Severus retreated, Harry was still smiling, and Severus’s wand arm dropped to his side as he looked at Harry with amazement. “You came back.”

“I did, sir. I came back.”

“You...you foolish boy,” Severus said, but it was lacking his usual bite. 

“I can’t take all the credit. Your clues helped, and...and Jeremiah,” Harry added softly, thinking of the boy he’d left behind. He could still hear the plea that Jeremiah had shouted as he left. His heart tugged with the loss.

“I confess I did not think it would really work,” Severus said.

Harry smiled again, “Ah, but it did. And now I’m back. I was worried I wouldn’t make it back in time though. Professor, why did you kill yourself?”

Severus frowned at him, “I haven’t.”

“But you did, in the future. You killed yourself after hiding me here. They found you down by a tree at the base of these rocks. That wasn’t part of our plan, was it?”

Severus sighed, and glanced behind him into the cave where Harry’s body was hidden from view. “I failed to save you, and there would be too many questions about what had happened to your body. I saw no way to prevent them from prying the information out of me. It was...the only way I could guarantee you would not be found until it was time.”

Harry felt somber and in awe of this man, this friend. This person who despite all of their past animosity, had made the ultimate sacrifice to save him. “Professor...thank you. For everything you’ve done for me.”

“It is no more than what you have done for all of us, Potter,” Severus said softly, a look of almost...love in his eyes.

“Me? I just did that hero thing you’ve always hated,” Harry joked because to let the emotions that were filling him with the realization of how much Severus cared for him show would surely make both of them uncomfortable. He asked, “So what now?”

Severus cleared his throat and replied, “Now I suppose I do not have to kill myself. Thank you for that.”

“What’s saving one more life when I’ve already saved the entire wizarding world, eh?”

Severus almost smiled. Almost. “We should go back to the castle, Potter. They have surely noticed you are gone, and will be happy to see you back, alive and well.”

“I don’t know if I want to give Poppy that heart attack,” Harry quipped, but his face fell as he continued softly, “But I can’t go back.”

Severus frowned at him, “What do you mean?”

“There’s...a complication I didn’t think about when we made this plan.”

“What complication?”

“Professor...the person who brought me back, well, it took over three hundred years. Everyone here...they lived on. They had kids. Their kids had kids. And at some point in the future...Jeremiah was born. If I stay...I don’t know if he’ll have been born. Not in this timeline anyway. By coming back, I may have sentenced him to die or...disappear. Cease to exist. And I made a promise that I would _never_ forget what he’s done for me.”

“Potter, you’ve come back. You have already doomed him to whatever fate it is that may come of his helping you return,” Severus pointed out.

Harry shook his head, “No, I could still fix that. I just couldn’t live with myself if I let you die and...and let Draco...I have to clear his name, you understand? You and I are the only ones who know what Draco actually did for the war, for you...for me. I need you to tell his story. Our story. _My_ story.”

“What are you saying, Harry?” Severus whispered, afraid of the answer.

“Do you have an empty vial?” Harry asked.

Without replying, Severus pulled a small vial from his pocket and handed it to Harry. He was beginning to understand. Harry smiled softly, and pulled his wand from his pocket. He raised it to his temple and closed his eyes. He couldn’t help the tears that leaked as silver threads were pulled from his temple. The threads grew thicker, until Harry finally opened his eyes and flicked his wand towards the opening of the vial. The silver tendrils filled it and he stoppered the bottle with the glass topper. He held it out to Severus, “Here. Take these, and make sure the Wizengamot sees them. Make sure everyone sees them. It will clear your name...and Draco’s. And he’ll know how much I...how much I loved him.”

“How do you know that by doing this, you won’t already be altering the future so much that this boy isn’t born?”

Harry smiled sadly, “It’s just one of those Gryffindor gut feelings you always hated me relying on.”

Severus took the vial and held it like it was a precious gift. He met Harry’s gaze, “What will you do, then?”

“I’ll find my happy ending, Severus.”

~*~ Future, Hogwarts Castle ~*~

It was his last year at Hogwarts and Jeremiah had elected to stay for winter break again, as had most of the seventh year students. One last hurrah before they graduated. It had been a year, almost to the day, since Harry Potter had came and went from his life. He hadn’t told a soul. It was something he’d probably always keep to himself. In that year, he’d changed a lot in his life. He’d befriended Melanie Weasley, for starters. Once you got past the surface, she wasn’t as much of a snobby know-it-all as he’d thought. She was still a know-it-all, but she was also rather funny and really loyal.

He’d also decided to pursue a career in muggle relations after Hogwarts. He hoped that eventually he could go to a muggle university to study science and find ways to blend muggle science with magic, something that hadn’t been done successfully before. Melanie was not only supportive of his decision but also wanted to join him. His friend Cameron thought they were both bonkers but also admitted that he was fascinated with how muggles managed to use plants for medicine. 

It was snowing out, a few days before Christmas, and once again Jeremiah’s feet carried him out to the field he’d last seen Harry. He missed Harry, and once again wondered what had become of him. He hoped he’d found his happily ever after. He knelt down and grabbed some snow, packing it into a ball shape. Then he pulled his wand out and cast, “Engorgio!”

It became a much larger ball, about 3 feet tall. He made another small snowball and enlarged this one as well, slightly smaller than the first, placing it on top of the first one. Finally he made a third and placed that on top of the two. He fished around in the snow to find two small rocks and placed them on the head of the snowman he’d made. Then he drew a mouth and nose, found two sticks to serve as arms, and stepped back to look at his creation. It was missing just one thing...he reached out and drew a scar on its forehead. Smiling slightly, he admired his creation for a moment before a gust of wind caused him to shiver. He decided it was time to go back to the castle.

He had just turned away from the snowman when the wind picked up again, this time causing snow to drift up from the ground and swirl around him. His scarf almost flew away from him but he caught it and fastened it tighter about his neck. Another gust of wind left him floundering off-balance. Definitely time to head back to the castle. He took a few steps before he tripped on a rock under the snow and fell to the ground. He groaned, but as suddenly as the wind had picked up, it died down again, leaving the snow falling gently once more. He started to push himself to his feet when a hand reached out to him.

“Let me help you up,” a voice said.

Jeremiah grabbed the offered hand, “Thanks.”

He looked up as he was pulled, and his eyes widened. Harry offered a shaky grin. "That wind was a bit crazy, eh?”

"Oh...my...god...HARRY!" Jeremiah jumped up and launched himself at Harry, his arms going around his neck, and he knocked them both onto the ground. Harry yelped with a laugh, and Jeremiah felt tears spring to his eyes. Harry was here. Harry was _here!_

"Did I worry you?" Harry asked from where he still lay on the ground.

"You...I...and then...it’s been a year!” Jeremiah stammered, pushing himself off of Harry clumsily, feeling embarrassed that he was crying but his heart was pounding. He stared at Harry in awe. It didn’t look like he’d aged a day.

"Yeah, sort of like that, I guess," Harry joked. "Actually...I wasn't sure...I just had to see, to make sure I belonged here."

"You...belong....here?" Oh shut up shut up shut up! Speak, you moron! Jeremiah's tongue just couldn't seem to work right, and his mind didn't seem to be in any better shape.

Harry looked at him and smiled softly. "Yes, I believe I do. I believe this...this is my happily ever after."

"With...me?" Jeremiah asked stupidly.

"Yeah, with you. If you want?"

"Yes!" Well, at least Jeremiah was able to say that correctly. He laughed and swiped tears from his cheeks. "I was so worried...there was nothing in the books and I didn't know...I didn't know..."

"It's okay. Calm down. We have plenty of time to explain things," Harry said.

"But...Draco...didn't you...?"

"He...I went back but...there was this feeling that things had to be different. That by going back, I was changing too much," Harry said softly. "I'll always love him, and I'm sure he always loved me but...if he didn't have a family, how would you have been born? You brought me back, Jeremiah. There was a reason for that... You see?"

Yes, Jeremiah thought. Yes, he saw. He had seen it from the moment he had found that first clue. This was meant.

And Harry was smiling up at him, and reaching out to brush snow off his hair, and then his hand was curling behind Jeremiah’s neck and pulling him down into their first kiss. First of many. First of a lifetime. And Jeremiah could finally breathe again.

**Fin.**


End file.
